The race meeting set down for last month was washed out after heavy rain fell on the track in the days leading up to the scheduled race date.

Close to 240 millimetres of rain has fallen on the track since Christmas.

Course manager Steve Tapp said at the weekend that six barrier trials were held on the track the previous Monday and there were no complaints about the track.

“The surface was a heavy eight for the trials and the horses hardly marked it,” Tapp said.

“The track has a very thick coverage of grass, but a week of fine weather would be handy.”

The three highlight meetings during 2016 will be the traditional Anzac Day meeting, Jungle Juice Cup day and Cessnock Cup day.

Cessnock’s favourite racing son, Robert Thompson, closing in on 4200 winners will be in action at Cessnock on Monday. Entry is free.

Meanwhile, Cessnock trainer Jeremy Sylvester and the twenty owners of the talented galloper Three Sheets are having a ball.

 In his past two starts in Queensland, Three Sheets has earned prizemoney of more than $90,000.

Ridden by Robert Thompson he finished second in the Magic Millions Country Cup on the Gold Coast in early January.

Three Sheets backed up a week later to win a Metropolitan class race at the Sunshine Coast with Teegan Harrison aboard.

Sylvester said earlier this week that Three Sheets and stablemate Championmet will run in the Highway Handicap, a race for country-trained horses at Randwick next Saturday.

Both horses have been set for the rich Country Championship series.

Under the conditions the pair have to run in the Scone heat on February 21 and if unsuccessful, they can back up in the Muswellbrook Wild Card heat on February 29.

The Thompson family will have a talented sprinter heading to the Country Championships.

Fabry, who boasts a terrific race record, is part owned by Robert’s mum Phyllis and his son Simon and daughter-in-law Alison, and is trained at Port Macquarie by Simon’s father-in-law, Neil Godbolt.

The bold front-runner will contest the Taree heat with Robert aboard.