Published March 2025
The Brisbane Racing Club (BRC) has welcomed new Chair Richard Morrison and new CEO Karl deKroo into their leadership team as it enters a new era of modernisation.
BRC CEO Karl deKroo said: “There’s great history that comes with a racing club that’s been around one hundred and sixty years, but also challenges in terms of upkeep and meeting modern-day standards.
“The infrastructure and spectator precinct at Eagle Farm are definitely a high priority for myself, the board and my management team to focus on in the short-term,” he said.
Eagle Farm has the largest turnover out of any track in Queensland, and is the state’s biggest training base, with over four hundred horses being stabled there each day.
Mr deKroo said as “the engine room of the whole racing industry in Queensland”, Eagle Farm needs to have a facility representative of the sport’s headquarters.
BRC Chair Richard Morrison said: “We’re taking our [members and racegoers] into a room that we’ve tarted up, but it’s at the back of a grandstand with no view of a racetrack, we don’t have proper disabled access, and we literally don’t have air-conned rooms.
“People expect modern standards if they’re going to spend their hard-earned money on a day out. We need to offer them something that’s better than what they’d get at home,” Mr Morrison said.
Eagle Farm’s main spectator grandstand and members area, the John Power Stand, was built in the 1950s with a lifespan of fifty years, its slated end of life being 2006.
Mr deKroo said: “The club’s been able to nurse it through to this point, but the engineers have now made it clear that we can’t use it past August 2026. What none of us want is for it to become a safety concern.
“We… don’t have a path for funding the new grandstand at the moment,” he said.
Mr Morrison said: “To be perfectly frank, the new stand doesn’t happen without the Government’s support.
“We’re not just a race club, we’re a community club as well. We do a lot of other events on course like school dances and exams for the schools around here who don’t have large enough facilities. We love doing it, but there’s nowhere else around the area for those types of groups to use.
“We’re optimistic that once [the new Racing Minister] understands the background and the need for a new grandstand, hopefully it’ll be something the government can look favourably upon,” Mr Morrison said.
Although the BRC has some considerable challenges to navigate over the next few years, Mr Morrison and Mr deKroo are well-placed to lead the club through them.
Prior to being elected as Chair, Mr Morrison Vice Chaired the club for nine years, on the board for another four years before that.
Mr Morrison is also Managing Director of property development and real estate company, Morrison Project Consulting, and Executive Director of family business, Madison Sport.
Mr deKroo spent sixteen years working as a journalist and in management roles at NewsCorp, before working as Ladbrokes’ Chief Commercial Officer for six years, often working with major racing clubs, including the BRC.
He said: “[Because of that], I have a really good understanding of what the club is built on and a lot of the key players.”
