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A Fifth Day For Cheltenham?

D

Desperate Dan

Senior Jockey
Joined
May 2, 2003
Messages
3,032
Location
Liverpool
Here we go again, with fresh speculation that the beancounters are preparing us for an extra day for the Festival. It little matters that virtually nobody except them wants it. If they can extract a few quid more from the extra day then that`s sufficient justification for them. The dilution clearly evidenced since the addition of a fourth day will continue....probably with a couple of selling hurdles either side of the Gold Cup!! We need a campaign to save us from the beancounters!
 
I’m happy with a Saturday Gold Cup, but 5 days is pushing it too far. I’ve grown to like the 4-day Festival quite a bit now, and I like some of the more recent races. I like one Grade 1 race per day, not The Stayers lumped in with another Grade 1; it provides a nice rhythm to the meeting.
 
We've got 28 races over 4 days at the moment, so they only need two more races to make a 6 race 5 day card. We know the mares chase is on the way. A mares novice chase will surely follow. A 2.5 mile graded hurdle has been mentioned in the past as well. They may even experiment with a shorter X-Country race. I'm not sure what they be thinking in terms of handicaps though. Any thoughts?

I think it'll happen a year earlier in 2022 with those three races added. Initially I suspect Saturday will be a 7 race card with the Gold Cup and not much else. They'll do what they can to pack the other days with as much quality as possible, and then slowly expand to a 5 day 7 race card.

The only plus side as a racing fan is it would give them an opportunity to switch courses with a few races. Both the Stayers Hurdle and the Albert Bartlett would benefit from a switch for example. I can't think of a single other plus.

Ultimately I'm with the vast majority and don't want it to happen, and I'm fairly sure my liver won't last a fifth day. But if it does happen I'll still be there.
 
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I think it's a really bad idea but smacks of a money grabbing exercise and can't see the gain to the actual sport. Four days are exhausting if you want to go for all of it, and that's from someone who doesn't drink while they are there, and doesn't have to drive usually for all 4 days to get there and back! Aside from that it's not inexpensive now and I have somewhere free to stay. I think the card at the moment on Gold Cup day is the 'worst' but if you want to be there for the GC, then one tends to put up with the rest of the day because of it. I have done all 4 days a few times but only because there's one race a day I really want to see. This year because of work and money, I only went for 2, the Thursday and the Friday, because I wanted to see Frodon and Bryony and was hedging my bets when booking tickets, but I would have loved to go on Bumper day, but had to sacrifice that for the two days. I think there would be a limit to how many could afford the 5, particularly those who have to travel and pay for local accommodation.
 
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granger said:
They will end up adding the legends chase.

Not sure full tilt on likely ground with plenty of good is what the oldtimers will need
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I think adding a Veteran's Chase would be a terrible idea. We never want to lose a horse but imagine if we lost an ex-Gold Cup winner for example. There are the Fergus Wilson's of this world to consider too, who will be buying anything they can lay their hands on to run them too. The race would be a recipe for disaster if there were fatalities.
 
Maruco said:
I think adding a Veteran's Chase would be a terrible idea. We never want to lose a horse but imagine if we lost an ex-Gold Cup winner for example. There are the Fergus Wilson's of this world to consider too, who will be buying anything they can lay their hands on to run them too. The race would be a recipe for disaster if there were fatalities.
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Couldn't agree more
 
I can remember one major course (at the time) running a 4yo chase on its biggest day of the year -name the course.
 
Chepstow on Welsh National Day when it was run before Christmas.It was a fairly horrendous event -notable for bad jumping and a poor completion rate.
 

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