Eight race cards

Shadow Leader

Shadow Leader

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Nov 9, 2003
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Marvellous - according to the RP, the BHA has sanctioned plans to allow jumps tracks to stage eight race cards (rather than the maximum seven it is/was) in an attempt to 'boost turnover'. That'll do the ground a lot of good, won't it?! Eight races run on winter ground in races that often comprise two circuits or more of the majority of tracks. By the eighth race (imagine the second/third days of longer meetings!) the ground will be well and chewed up; ideal for babies running in the bumper which is often the last race on the card. :rolleyes:

Is there anyone with any common sense involved in making decisions about running British racing?!
 
Eight race cards are not unusual during the winter in Ireland but it is normally the likes of Navan which has loads of space or the inside track in Punchestown. And they have 30 runner maiden hurdles and handicaps so there could easily be 150 horses over the ground before the bumper, albeit for a two mile race they only come up the straight twice and not the full circuit twice.
 
Yes, interesting facts, Cantoris. The courses in Ireland do tend to look a lot wider than many of those in the UK, so I can see how moving rails in and out helps to keep down too much wear and tear.

Shadz, I do understand where you're coming from, but many courses have been running 8 and even 9 race cards already - they've had their regular 7 up, and tacked on two pony races afterwards, viz Plumpton last season. So the ground's still run over as much as it will be with a 'regular' 8-race package.

As for babies in the Bumpers, again I see your point, but why does a Bumper have to be the end race? What's the prob with starting the day with it? Phil Bell at Fontwell began dragging it forward, so that there wasn't the mass exit prior to its running, which actually keeps bums on barstools a bit longer. Put the Bumper on first or second, and the babes aren't likely to fall into the potholes. Put the grinding 3m+ chases on last, where hopefully they're running a little slower, and can pick their way round a bit more and leave the heaviest impact 'til last.

That'll be £250,000, I thank you!

What I'm not too convinced about is that the UK - as against Ireland and its cavalry-charge size fields on the Flat and in jumps - has sufficient numbers to make regular 8-race meets interesting. I can see more ditzy 4 and 5-runner fields, which aren't competitive for punting purposes and will be a turn-off, rather than a turn-on for the betting public and thus the Gods O'Racing - the bookies.
 
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There have been the odd 8 race NH cards Kri but only when permission has been granted by the BHA, and usually (excepting extenuating circumstances, ie Cheltenham last year) on summer cards when the ground is much firmer and not going to be cut up to shreds by the end. For starters, as Colin has pointed out, there just aren't the daylight hours to stage 8 race cards in the winter. Pony races don't count, I'm afraid - they don't give a four X what the ground is like, it's a few ponies cantering on the flat over less than a mile, not at all comparable to bumpers or hurdles/chases run last.
 
There are the daylight hours in the winter to stage 8 races, if the first one starts no later than noon, which brings us round to the dreadful 'breakfast meeting' mooted elsewhere! I can see jumps meetings being quite suited to 'brunch meetings', in fact. Open the gates at 9.30 a.m., dish up brunch around 11, kick off the races at noon - noon start, 12.30, 1.00, 1.30, 2.00, 2.30, 3.00, 4,00, and off home before the godawful homeward gallop from the offices kicks in.

Frankly, I'd rather attend something like that, than the lengthy snore of a 4-course lunch and being decanted out when it's getting really dark and all humankind is hitting the roads from 5.00 onwards to get home. I used to hate leaving Fontwell after the last race, to get snarled in homebound traffic.

However, I very much doubt that there are enough jumps nags to go round to sustain the idea - let's face it, at bread-and-butter levels, it's hard enough to scrape up six competitive runners for chases a lot of the time.
 
For a few weeks during the season, it is dark at 16.00. It is also the case that in general 35 minute gaps are needed for NH cards due to them being a longer distance and lasting for a lot longer than flat races.

However, that still doesn't get away from the main issue of ripping up the ground, especially wet winter ground often pounded over at least twice in each race. Jesus, isn't the ground at a lot of tracks enough of a mess already as it is, due to over-racing and over-watering? Hey, so let's stick extra races on already torn-up ground and make it even worse? Great plan!
 
Shadow Leader said:
For a few weeks during the season, it is dark at 16.00. It is also the case that in general 35 minute gaps are needed for NH cards due to them being a longer distance and lasting for a lot longer than flat races.

However, that still doesn't get away from the main issue of ripping up the ground, especially wet winter ground often pounded over at least twice in each race. Jesus, isn't the ground at a lot of tracks enough of a mess already as it is, due to over-racing and over-watering? Hey, so let's stick extra races on already torn-up ground and make it even worse? Great plan!
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I agree and it is dark enough sometimes before 4 o'clock to make visibility potentially a problem. Unless a course has the capacity to have fresh ground each day when having racing for more than one day at a time, which many would not, I do not think it is feasible. As an aside from the groung issue, would courses put up their entrance prices for staging more races each day? Entry fees are an issue for a lot of people now. The potential to charge more, ignoring other factors to see an extra one or two races, could have a detrimental affect on attendances.
 
There is no higher entrance fee for 6, 7, or 8 race cards at present, so why would there be in future? The courses pay their staff by the meeting, not by the hours spent working at the track. For all they care, they could hold 10 and 12 race cards and not pay for a longer period of service from the ambulance crews, stalls handlers, the caterers or the raceday staff.

Shadz, I'm putting the case for how it already works - it doesn't matter that little ponies skipped daintily across the muddied fields at Plumpton - the timing of the races still fitted in. 7-race regular NH card, two pony spritzes after. No problem with fading light, blah, blah. So if you move the races forward a little, they fit in extremely well. It'll happen all right.
 
I said 'potential' and I was not referring to the courses passing on the rise in the form of pay rises to their staff either. Most courses put their costs up at regular intervals; you cannot say with certainty that they would not put the price up by more than they might have if not staging an extra race/races?
I have been NH racing enough to have experienced when the light is so bad it makes it difficult to watch as a spectator never mind for those participating.
 
Kri, you are completely ignoring the main issue of the ground being ripped up and torn to shreds; not only for the last race but for the future meetings. After a few 8 race cards of NH races on winter ground, a lot of tracks will be in a dire state.

As for the daylight issue, pony races are staged occasionally after racing, it is by far the norm, and I wouldn't imagine that they were staged in mid-winter (when daylight hours are at their shortest) after 7 race cards unless those cards started at 11am, which to my recollection hasn't been happening.
 
Quite often the ground is torn up enough over 7 races and by that 7th race, on winter ground, it can quite often be desperate anyway. Running another race on that would not only add insult to injury, cumulatively in particular it would wreck the ground over the course of a season to the point where it may not recover as well as it should.
 
I was at a meeting earlier this year where the meeting got the go ahead on the 4th inspection as the ground was so sodden. People who I knew worked there could not believe it had actually been passed as raceable. By the 3rd race, the ground was atrocious and horses were struggling to get through it. Before the fourth race jockey representatives insisted the COC look at it again as they felt the ground was so bad. The meeting carried on but a number of horses were withdrawn, and a high number who ran in the later races were pulled up and did not complete. I can't remember if there were six or 7 races that day but by the last race a fair area of the course resembled a quagmire, not a race course.
 
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I think there is a point at which the ground, while horrible to continue running on on the day, is incapable of getting any worse from a maintenance point of view. It just becomes an exercise in displacement of muck. On tight courses this point can be reached on the bends after no more than a couple of races. In fact the wider courses can take a bigger hit down the straights as jockeys wander around looking for anything resembling grass.
 
Shadow Leader said:
As for the daylight issue, pony races are staged occasionally after racing, it is by far the norm, and I wouldn't imagine that they were staged in mid-winter (when daylight hours are at their shortest) after 7 race cards unless those cards started at 11am, which to my recollection hasn't been happening.
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Especially not when the little darlings should be at school!!!!
 
G-G: you could still get that situation in the middle of a wet summer, though - and God knows that Ireland's been fair sloshing through huge pools of standing water, both on the Flat and over jumps, during this one! The UK's been dry, Ireland's been sodden. It is far from being a condition of only winter racing.
 
Bumpers are I imagine always last because of the problem of poor visibility - not just fading light but low sun, making jumping very dangerous.

I agree that 8-race NH cards are a thoroughly bad idea, not least for eg security staff who would have to stand in one spot outside for an unhealthily long time!

The would just give more trainers the chance of more racing for the kind of poor jumpers who should not be in the game anyway - for all sorts of reasons it would be likely to lead to more casualties
 
Security staff stand in one spot for an unhealthily long time for 8 Flat races, Sara - what's the diff?

Bumpers are usually last (not always) because the hurdles would get in the way otherwise! I was asking Neil McKenzie-Ross about whether we'd be doing any early jumps meets at Lingfield or Folkestone, and wondered if the Bumper couldn't go on earlier. The answer is no, because you have a chase course and a hurdles course, with the jumps set up ready for racing. Once the last hurdles race is run, you pull them out for the Bumper, which is a darn sight simpler than banging them in and aligning them. Simples!
 
Difference is that most flat racing with 8 races takes place in high summer (and yes I do know there are 3 a/w tracks which race in 'all weathers'- it's chatting to security at GLs last winter which brought it home to me how they suffer!)
 
krizon said:
G-G: you could still get that situation in the middle of a wet summer, though - and God knows that Ireland's been fair sloshing through huge pools of standing water, both on the Flat and over jumps, during this one! The UK's been dry, Ireland's been sodden. It is far from being a condition of only winter racing.
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I didn't actually specify time of year but yes it could happen in the summer so the ground would still be cut up badly after day one of a meeting with 8 races, so for day 2 of a big meeting it could be unraceable.
 
Yes, they do, Colin, so where they slotted in wouldn't be an issue - but it would at Folkestone. I should probably have made that more clear in my post.
 
Nurse! NURSE! Bring the tranquillizer dart! Shadz will need extreme restraint - EIGHT RACES AT KELSO! :lol: Four hurdles, two chases and two Bumpers.

Not only eight - but two pony spritzes before, too! (It just gets better, doesn't it?!) Gordon Brown says they 'left quite a print' in the extra-long grass, so it's as well the Clerk's employed a special extra-growth feed to the turf for the li'l darlins.

Is it safe to come back now - has Shadz been tied to the bed and darted?
 
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