Moving Races...

[stodge]

One of the perks of those groups which own a number of racecourses is the ability to move races to different tracks within the same group. Jockey Club Racecourses moved the Temple Stakes from Sandown to Haydock and I'm sure Northern Racing have moved races.

Arena have done it as well in the past and I now read that the Summit Junior Hurdle has been moved from Lingfield's most prestiguous NH card to Doncaster. The reason given seems to be the frequency of abandonment of the Lingfield card though I believe the Cheltenham card also stages a 3-y-o hurdle at the mid-December meeting.

I'm fascinated to know what Arena will do if bad weather threatens BOTH fixtures - do they have frost covers for both meetings or will Lingfield be sacrificed to save Doncaster ?

The Lingfield meeting, if not abandoned, is often staged on very deep ground and some may say that's a big task for inexperienced juveniles but Francois Doumen sent horses over to run in it and some horses relish the heavy ground.

 

[krizon]

As a previous Annual Member, Stodge, you'll remember that the lost NH meetings at Lingfield were down to failure to adequately drain the back straight, which comes up very, very deep, meaning that it presents a hazard to horses running on merely GS or S at that point. Arena has not put any money into addressing this annual problem and it's never made sense to me to have the token half-dozen NH fixtures it has when it knows it'll lose one, if not two, to bog. The frost is not the most likely hazard - Arena's refusal to spend money draining that section of course is.

I've no doubt that for an outlay of around £25-30,000 to hire in frost sheets, that money will be spent on Doncaster, don't you think? There's always a good turnouot for all of the few NH meetings at Lingfield, but not that good to justify hiring sheets for two meetings. I'd put money on it!