Cheltenham Abandoned

*#*###***!!!.
Just arrived home. Good racing,bad betting day yesterday. Up with the lark today checking form, getting best prices. Then wallop. Can't go tomorrow and Friday hospitality held back for me has disappeared, presumably to someone rady to pay more.
Evil Day and scarey too as on the M5, my car, a pretty substantial Landcruiser, was hit by a sudden gust and moved sideways by 4 or 5 feet.I ended up seemingly inches in front of a artic lorry and have never put the pedal to the floor faster. Cold sweat indeed.
 
While admittedly further than Warbler from Cheltenham, being down here in Somerset, if the winds are the same strength there as here, they were absolutely correct in calling off the day.

Normal exercise probably is continuing up and down the country but I doubt many are schooling over jumps in high winds, let alone taking them at proper racing pace for the durations of 2 miles plus with a valuable Cheltenham horse.

Has it not occurred to some on here that Cheltenham's insurers would have the last word on whether or not they were allowed to proceed?
 
Courtesy of The Racing Post

Insurance set to cover millions of pounds of losses
by Tony Smurthwaite


INSURANCE cover will soak up much of the millions of pounds of losses being faced by Cheltenham racecourse because of the abandonment of day two of the Festival, management said on Wednesday.

Lost income from corporate customers, paying racegoers, trade stands, shops, bookmakers and the myriad of food and drink outlets at Prestbury Park was not quantified in the immediate aftermath of the shock announcement, but the impact is expected to be substantial.

Edward Gillespie, managing director at Cheltenham, said: "We have an insurance programme in place, the vagaries of which have yet to be fully examined. We hope that the next two days' racing will offset some of the costs that we will have to refund, such as income from ticket sales.

"We can't put a figure on the cost ofthe abandonment as we are concentrating on running the two days up ahead."

No advance warning of the dangers to racing was given on Tuesday evening, despite management being aware of the potential for high winds and with damage already evident in the tented village.
Defending the course's approach to keeping the public informed, Gillespie added: "We did not have enough hard information to share.

"Yesterday evening what we were looking at was that we needed an improvement in conditions to be able to race. We felt sufficient time would be allowed in the morning and we had seen improvement from Monday night to Tuesday morning, when expectations for wind speeds were lowered by 10-15mph. You get more certainty over conditions the closer you get to an event and we have been here before 5am for the past two mornings. We have wind monitors and a helicopter."

Green-belt planning guidelines make it a "very major planning challenge" to replace temporary structures with permanent buildings, according to Gillespie, in response to the damage that ended any prospects of racing on Wednesday.

"The sheer investment to provide permanent buildings would be difficult to justify," he added.
 
The thought of Championship horses - or any horses - in the air in a bunch when a 60mph gust hits doesn't bear thinking about. Definitely the correct decision... If a marquee had lifted with its scaffold poles still slotted in.... ditto

Agreed, with all the profits they are making, they MUST get permanent structures in place for this 'essential' hospitality.

As for selling hospitality badges on eBay - well you are taking a risk aren't you?
I know people often have a spare badge, but most of us I imagine could find a buyer pretty easily...
That's why I don't trust eBay badge sales for these big meetings. They can easily be forged
 
Originally posted by Kathy@Mar 12 2008, 10:42 AM


I feel for the jockeys and trainers etc. It must be a nightmare for some of them with the logistics of moving the horses and the racecourse stables for finding enough accomodation for them all etc. Also those trainers that will have had to turn back and take their horses home - not so easy if you have come all the way from Ireland.
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Courtesy of The Racing Post

Runners may move to Warwick to aid stabling availability
Friday runners: could move to Warwick to ease bottleneck in availability of stable boxes
by Tony Smurthwaite

RUNNERS on Cheltenham's bulging nine-race card on Friday may be temporarily moved to Warwick racecourse in a bid to ease a bottleneck in the availability of stable boxes due to the abandonment of racing on Wednesday.

The move could encompass many of the Irish-trained contenders who have already arrived for the meeting such as Forpadytheplasterer, who runs in the transferred Ballymore Properties Novices' Hurdle, Gold Cup hope Afistfullofdollars and Coral Cup favourite Leg Spinner.

In addition, those horses still housed at Cheltenham who ran on Tuesday and yet to be taken home will also be temporarily taken to Warwick racecourse, officials atthe BHA said.

More dramatically, a contingency plan is being considered for runners in the Christies' Foxhunter Chase on Friday to be allowed to run without being stabled at the racecourse.
If that unusual contingency is needed, extra security guards and veterinary technicians would be drafted in to a temporary horsebox park somewhere close to the racecourse.

BHA spokesman Paul Struthers said on Thursday: "We have ensured that every runner on the ten-race card on Thursday will have its own box. There are 295 boxes at Cheltenham in use during the Festival.

"We are making contingencies for Friday and there is a possibility that they might affect the Foxhunter. What we are planning is that they might be allowed to run without being stabled, as can happen at point-to-points. This is a contingency just in case there is a slight problem with capacity."
 
The lads and lasses on security duty at Cheltenham will be no doubt be having a bit of a nightmare today. Horses all have to be booked in for accomodation and the vets scan the horses which is pretty straightforward on a normal day. If some horses are then to be moved out of boxes, returned home (if they are local enough) to make space for those that have to wait two days or those that are now off to possibly Warwick, it will be quite a task to track which horses are coming in, which ones are staying longer and which ones are being transferred. :what: I'm sure they will do a sterling job! Some boxes may well have to be disinfected too if different horses are in and out of the same boxes just to safeguard against any horse that may be carrying a virus.

I do feel some people may forget that despite all the obvious upsets of cancelling todays meeting from an owners, trainers, racecourses and punters point of view, the whole knock on effect will have caused more than a few headaches today behind the scenes.
 
Originally posted by Kathy@Mar 12 2008, 12:17 PM
They (Edward Gillespie on C4 news) just said that people wouldn't have to apply for their refunds as the money would be repaid to the people who purchased the badges whose names will be on their database.
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Oh dear.

Though in truth, I'd expect the person who sold me mine to pay me out, though I'm still wondering about the legality of Cheltenham's position. Does the ticket itself not constitute a contract? The terms and conditions for its use are stated, and it includes provision for cancelation, it should therefore fall into something along similar lines of 'I promise to pay the bearer' I'd have thought. Are they discriminating against people who haven't got credit cards and have had to rely on third parties to purchase the ticket hence shifting the onus from one person to chase another one down. I'd have thought they'd have welcomed the chance to refund on the gate given that they'd stand a better opportunity of getting some of the money back on the day, as well as reducing their postage bill.

I think the 80mph stuff is hysterical misreporting Kathy. You wouldn't be able to walk in a wind at that speed, and we haven't been remotely close to that all day. Exposed parts of mountain tops and mountain passes have recorded those figures, and it's not unheard of, but I'd be very surprised if Cheltenham was anywhere beyond 55-60mph during the last 24 hours
 
Yes you would think they would refund on the day esp for people who could prove their identity and provide a credit card number. But how many people got there? Glad I wasn't going - it would never have occoured to me to check if racing was on before setting off! Did anyone make the journey?
 
I've just come back from our office in Wellington to learn that my ma-in-law who (admittedly not a strapping 16.2 chaser !!!) is a small but doughty 82yo was blown off her feet while shopping in the town and was taken by a kind bypasser to the office to recover! She's got some bruises on her face to show for it and it goes to demonstrate that, as Warbler points out above, a wind tunnel can quite easily create very strong gusts and I think that for once Cheltenham took a sensible decision in pretty trying circumstances.
 
Mr.Gillespee was interviewed on RTE Radio tonight, and asked why not move Weds to Saturday? He mentioned a lot of inconveniences but never once said anything about the travel home difficulties for Irish visitors. He sounded like and arrogant B%stard. Am I being over touchy?
 
I gather a major consideration was that there are no staff hired for Saturday, 5500 on duty normally.

Many staff are booked for Uttoxeter (Midlands Grand National Day) on Saturday.

Also a lot of the police will not be available as they have to monitor the Cheltenham v Bristol Rovers match on Sat afternoon.
 
Possibly - I didn't hear the interview but I read elsewhere that Saturday was a no-no with the police so he probably didn't think too hard about it.

On the other hand, this is the guy who once said "“We would hope that Cheltenham does not become a part of the Irish racing economy.”
 
No, that's what he's like, AC!

About the abandonment, while it may have been the correct decision (marginally), I'm not entirely comfortable with one aspect of it:

We have a situation where it's safe enough for horses, riders and fans, but end up being buggered by the corporates, who go from one big sporting occasion to another, sitting with their backs to the action, while they force obscene quantities of food and booze down their gullets.
 
Originally posted by Venusian@Mar 12 2008, 09:23 PM
We have a situation where it's safe enough for horses, riders and fans, but end up being buggered by the corporates, who go from one big sporting occasion to another, sitting with their backs to the action, while they force obscene quantities of food and booze down their gullets.
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It should be noted that those "evil" corporates provide massive funds for Cheltenham which allow the racecourse to be what it is today...not to mention the prize money etc.
 
Originally posted by Diamond Geezer+Mar 12 2008, 08:41 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Diamond Geezer @ Mar 12 2008, 08:41 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-Venusian@Mar 12 2008, 08:23 PM
We have a situation where it's safe enough for horses, riders and fans,
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Not strictly true Ven [/b][/quote]
If they didn't have all these tents around the place, I think they would have raced.
 
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