During these grandiose riding competitions, the management enforces a lot of rigorous entrance checks and requirements with the aim of promoting the safety and security of the high flying guests in attendance. Springdale’s catering and hospitality services are almost overwhelmed around this time, with the heavily peopled facility realizing unprecedented proceeds throughout the thrilling racing season. However, all the money generated by the Carolina Cup events does not wholly go to the race management club. Also engaged in charitable work, the organizers of the Carolina Cup in partnership with Springdale chose to channel a big chunk of the yearly proceeds into running the neighboring Kershaw County Medical Center.
During the Carolina Cup, the Springdale Racecourse gates are opened at 9:00 AM but the actual Carolina cup events are not staged until 1:30 PM. Since the annual equestrian racing events are widely attended and also attractant huge sponsorship deals, general admission charges are thirty dollars for all adult entrants if booked in advance but the admittance fee shoots to forty-five dollars for last-minute visitors. While the management does not demand any strict dressing codes, women are required to wear decent dresses and sunhats. For men, sports coats are highly encouraged although these are not mandatory.
The Springdale land on which the Carolina Cup events are held was formerly bought and developed as a sporting arena by the prominent chairman of the Jell-O Corporation, Ernest Woodward. Again, the prosperous investor gave about 600 acres of Springdale land to Ernest Kirkover in 1940 for he had financial difficulties managing the racecourse. Mr. Woodward is, therefore, one of the great behind-the-scenes names to which the cups present glory may be rightfully credited.
The Springdale property was sold to Mrs. Ambrose Clark of Aiken, South Carolina who had participated in the Carolina Cup of 1932 and subsequently won the first place. Starting with a not-so-large area of land continually bequeaths with the immutable instructions that the gifted acres be used exclusively for equine sporting gradually extended its frontiers to the present sprawling acres under its ownership and management. In short, much of the Springdale land on which the Carolina Cup takes place every year was acquired through charitable donations from wealthy lovers of equestrian racing action.
The Carolina Cup racing offices and the steeplechase museum are located on the grounds of the Springdale Racecourse. Over the years, the Carolina cup has continued to elicit a lot of excitement among American racegoers and trainers. In certain years, this electrifying anxiety surpasses fever pitch levels and it’s even palpable in European racing circles as all television screens over the other side of the Atlantic beam on the enthralling progress of the incomparable Carolina Cup.