Sandown fails inspection

Well, there isn't anything at the moment which protects to -10C, DO. Can you imagine the shrieks that would inevitably go up if the racing public found themselves facing the type of entry fees which would be involved to offset the costs of such equipment, if it exists at all? You're actually asking for racecourses to perform under greenhouse conditions - yes, you can, I believe, slide a great big roof over some stadia to protect them (like Wimbledon). See how many multi-millions that cost for one small dot of land, and try spreading that over the miles of Cheltenham? Sorry, it's just unworkable. National Hunt was based on the hunting calendar. Hunting took place through all sorts of weather, including snow. Perhaps it's time to acknowledge that the last vestiges of jumping's connections to the mother sport are now dead and gone, and move the Grade 1s to the summer, where you can be sure there'll be racing, even if it's then a question of expensive watering. Brighton's water bill for its season is around £20,000, as a very small example - the track's only 1m 4f - so you can imagine what costs would be like at the premier jumps courses, and then satisfy trainers that their quality horses' legs won't snap on landing impact.

Look, some activities just aren't possible due to harsh weather. Ask yourself seriously - who the feck's going to turn out in -10C and pay £100 and more for their entry ticket to see DENMAN or his future equivalent? You wouldn't get half the transport to the track for a start if weather conditions were that poor - most people would not relish trying to drive in such, and you do have to remember that many stables are located down little lanes and winding tracks - they're not conveniently ranged alongside the M5. You have to look at the overall picture and I don't think you'd find bookies willing to stand outside for hours in such conditions. In fact, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't get the groundstaff (as in the jumps attendants) to do so, either, as it's quite possibly becoming illegal to make people work, unless you're favouring gulag-like forced labour.

And where do you and your scheme go to when the thermometer indicates -12C? All the fancy equipment in the world just doesn't work at a certain point, which is why airports, railways lines and frequently roads aren't operational. I think you do need to place NH in the context of the real world, not some fantasy sport where things can go ahead willy-nilly. Would you turn out in such weather, and pay an enormous price to do so, just so you could see a Grade 1 on its scheduled day, rather than wait for it to be rescheduled to when temps were perhaps just a mere -1C? I don't think you would for one minute - you go racing little enough as it is, as do many armchair punters, so I'm sure you'd be putting your bets on from the comfort of your sofa, with a tea and buttie to hand, not freezing your nadgers off just because the course could run the meeting! It has to be cost-effective to the course - they're commercial enterprises, after all, not voluntary services to the punt-obsessed, who must have their daily Triple Exacta or die.
 
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I'm not disagreeing with any of that.

My opinion is largely irrelevant anyway since I don't go racing at all much, and only watch the terrestrial TV stuff (but not the AW) on TV on a Saturday. That's it. I couldn't care less what other racing takes place or doesn't and it doesn't bother me that racing is abandoned right, left and centre these days. If anything, I'm glad that some employees don't have to work in those conditions. I wouldn't want to.

All I'm saying is Joe Public (not me) whinges big style when meetings are called off yet others go ahead. I was critical that Sandown couldn't cope with less than half the frost that Cheltenham did cope with, so clearly there is a will at Cheltenham to race if at all possible. Maybe there wasn't quite the same will at Sandown because it wasn't really much of a card.
 
Really wasn't much of a card???

I suggest you look again at the card, which was well above average.
 
Hamm said:
Really wasn't much of a card???

I suggest you look again at the card, which was well above average.
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I have the card in front of me:

1.00
A six runner mares only race.

1.30
An 8-runner juvenile race, two of which were debutants and two of which hadn't been placed better than 7th, and worth only £5k to the winner.

2.05
A decent Class 2 h'cap chase contested by decent Class 3 chasers.

2.35
A Class 2 2m h'cap chase but only 8 runners for a £22k prize and none had won this season.

3.10
A 5-runner novice hurdle.

3.40
Another Class 3 handicap (only £12k to the winner) masquerading as a Class 2.

If you think that's a good card, you probably never get out of the toilet at the Cheltenham festival.
 
That's a pretty miserable view of things.

FYI - the 5 runner novice hurdle you describe is in fact a Grade 1. I presume you dismiss the Supreme Novices and Ballymore in the same vein?

The big hurdle race was essentially the ladbroke without the prize money.
 
Fontwell Park update: inspecting 1500 on Wednesday, track still frozen in advance of Friday fixture.

No course calls off a meeting because it 'isn't much of a card'! Racing is, after all, the reason why the facility has a licence at all - however much it tacks on wedding fairs and rented rooms for seminars. The course staff will have spent weeks in ensuring sponsorships, who's providing the BTO prizes, who's in hospitality, sending out thousands of badges to online bookings, fielding endless phone calls, and the catering staff will have been working like stink to prepare menus, lay up tables, get in the food and drink, let alone the raceday staff supervisors having to keep their own staff updated on the prospects of turning up for the day or not. Most staff are paid half-pay when the meeting's abandoned, too, since they've planned to work that day and scheduled other stuff around the day. There are thousands of manhours behind the scenes which are now lost for no income: no picture rights, no sponsorship, no seriously big income from hospitality, restaurant/s, bars, and peripheral catering. Any course would far rather run as near as dammit to safety levels as possible, than cancel. And that goes for cards with more vowels and consonants in the runners' form than Countdown! Salaries and other outgoings are the same, regardless of what calibre of nag turns up.
 
Hamm said:
FYI - the 5 runner novice hurdle you describe is in fact a Grade 1. I presume you dismiss the Supreme Novices and Ballymore in the same vein?

The big hurdle race was essentially the ladbroke without the prize money.
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When was the last time the Supreme Novices and/or the Ballymore were as weakly contested? It was a Grade 1 in name only.

"The Ladbroke without the prize money" was how Nicky Henderson described the hurdle handicap so no prizes for originality on your part. What you didn't mention was that NH also added, "but we have to run somewhere." The lack of prize money is as big an indicator as you'll get that this race was shaping up as a non-triers' convention. Why would any connections in their right mind compromise their chances of winning the TGT by picking up a penalty for winning the Sandown race.
 
I apologise unreservedly for my lack of originality.

Why do you care about the prize money??? What difference does it make to your enjoyment of the race whether it's for £50 or £50k? Same horses. You can always look for something to complain about if that's what you really want.

How can you judge it to be a poor Grade 1? Ghizao is extremely highly regarded by Nicholls, and ran too free last time at Cheltenham. The King horse looks one of his best juveniles to date, and Henderson's horse looks right at the top of his very impressive list of novices (albeit with it to prove against better opposition). Edited to say of course it's weaker than the Supreme or Ballymore - they are Championship events; this renewal looks more than upto standard.

The supporting races were more than up to Saturday standard as well.
 
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Hamm said:
Why do you care about the prize money??? What difference does it make to your enjoyment of the race whether it's for £50 or £50k? Same horses.
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Same horses to an extent but likely to be entirely different races, which would impact significantly upon my enjoyment of the race.

I imagine I'd spend about an hour doing the form. If the race was worth £50k, I'd expect almost all the runners to be trying and that the form has a good chance of working out, therefore if my figures are right I have a fair chance of backing the winner and turning a profit out of the race.

If it's worth £5k, I expect only three or four to be trying and I'd struggle to name which ones, therefore I don't have a fair chance of returning a profit.

It's why I don't bet in races worth less than £20k and don't necessarily enjoy watching them.
 
Bleak House...

Afternoon all :)

I appreciate Krizon's comments about all the effort that goes into meetings but the fact remains that in the depths of winter there is a reasonable chance that said meeting won't happen and I imagine racecourses must have some contingency against that.

How many times has the Tolworth meeting been cancelled in recent years ? Quite a few but we got used during the last few years to "open" winters and few abandonments.

IF we suffer a prolonged cold spell and lose 60 or more meetings, will we see "extra" meetings substituted and will these be biased toward the north which has lost a far greater proportion of cards than the south ?
 
Sometimes shit happens. This is the most prolonged very cold snap I can remember in the south for several years; many people are struggling to even get their horses out, nevermind to the track. So called 'all weather' gallops aren't what it says on the tin; the only way they live up to their name fully is if they are harrowed continually and usually with salt as well. This is at temperatures as high as 0 degrees Centigrade, nevermind -2 or -3 or even colder! So can you imagine what happens to turf?? It freezes at 0 degrees Centigrade and doesn't thaw instantly once the temperature rises to 1 degree above! There is no way any track could possibly race after -10, how on earth would anyone start proposing how they'd go about it? It's hard enough after about -2 and colder, even with frost covers, which are in no way infallible.

As for racecourses having their own covers, they are prohibitively expensive and most tracks would have no way of affording them. What happened at Sandown was that from early on in the week Cheltenham had use of most of the frost covers owned by Jockey Club Racecourses, who own both tracks. Hence why Sandown were only partly covered.

As it is, despite being halfway to the track when the news came through that it had been called off and despite having chased my backside around all morning to make it to the track as well as getting up earlier than usual, the only slight problem I could have had with the abandonment was that if they were being honest with themselves they could probably have called off the meeting first thing at the first inspection, rather than postponing the decision. Sometimes shit happens and there's not a lot any of us can do about extremes of weather.
 
But that's just it, DO: you don't 'totally' agree, because you seem to imagine it's a piece of pee for courses to overcome weather obstacles which have stymied airports, railways, and roads. You've said clearly that you think courses who expect to run Grade 1 races should have a way in which to be able to hold them, even when the weather's gone to -10C! Make your mind up. Either you agree that 'shit happens' and there's not a lot we can do about extremes of weather, or you don't. You can't argue both sides of the coin.
 
Update for Thursday: Lingfield is holding an extra meeting which will interestingly grant Robert Cooper's wish expressed at Wolves today for more Bumpers on the AW. There'll be three regular AW Flat races, and three Bumpers. Coops wanted to see all-Bumper meetings during the jumping hiatus, although Mike Cattermole didn't agree - thought that it wouldn't present much of a betting incentive, although why, I don't know. Come to think of it, doing away with Bumpers on NH grass completely wouldn't be such a bad idea - the idea is mainly to introduce the chaser-to-be to a course's environs and see out the trip, rather than struggle through the well-chewed muck that's usually left over at the end of six jumps or even seven jumps races. So why not just drift Bumpers over to AW courses and help the bedevilled NH Clerks to recover their mashed-up courses a bit better? Thoughts for/against?
 
I can't see a problem with running bumpers on the AW. I am sure some horses/trainers/owners wouldn't like it, but if one wants one's horse to run, and thinks any horse in question could cope with the surface, then why not? The cold snap is very frustrating for everyone trying to get their horses to have a run. If mine were still a bumper horse, then I would go for it.
 
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Wrong, K. I do agree.

My original point was that Sandown failed to go ahead when Cheltenham, which had experienced worse conditions, did. I wanted to know why. That's been answered. Cheltenham 'bagsed' the frost covers.

My own opinion is that this isn't an acceptable situation but that's where we stand.

Everything else was suggestion and conjecture, looking for a solution to an acute situation. I've never said it was easy for courses to overcome the problems. I accepted from the outset there would be cost implications. What I was complaining about was the lack of information about why racing can/cannot go ahead.



krizon said:
But that's just it, DO: you don't 'totally' agree, because you seem to imagine it's a piece of pee for courses to overcome weather obstacles which have stymied airports, railways, and roads. You've said clearly that you think courses who expect to run Grade 1 races should have a way in which to be able to hold them, even when the weather's gone to -10C! Make your mind up. Either you agree that 'shit happens' and there's not a lot we can do about extremes of weather, or you don't. You can't argue both sides of the coin.
Click to expand...
 
krizon said:
Update for Thursday: Lingfield is holding an extra meeting which will interestingly grant Robert Cooper's wish expressed at Wolves today for more Bumpers on the AW. There'll be three regular AW Flat races, and three Bumpers. Coops wanted to see all-Bumper meetings during the jumping hiatus
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Robert Cooper's wish????!! He's at least a year behind there!!! :lol:

I wrote a letter to the RP last year - and Barney Clifford was approached with the idea - regarding the possibilities of running bumpers on the AW cards or as an entire meeting since there had been so many NH abandonments at the time. Barney Clifford said that he couldn't stage a mixed AW and bumper card as the track has to be harrowed to a much greater depth for NH horses than for the flat horses, but that if the BHA were willing to fund it he might consider staging an all-bumper card.

Since so many meetings have been lost and trainers will have babies they cannot get a run into I think that AW cards with bumpers are a great idea and should be well populated I reckon.
 
I can only go by what I hear or see, ducks - well done to you for suggesting this earlier, but there's no prob to running the harrows deeper after the regular AWs have toddled back to their boxes, plenty of time between the last Flat and first Bumper race. That seems a rather odd counter to your suggestion: we run the Bumpers on the AW throughout the short NH season at Lingfield, anyway, so it's no biggie for Neil to tack on a couple more. I'm really looking forward to seeing who turns up - they will meet a need, it seems, and could prove to be an interesting draw for an unusual mix of crowd!
 
Isn't the main idea of extra meetings to provide some additional "product" for betting shop punters?

Given that bumpers tend to be light betting heats, it's hard to imagine the BHA will be falling over itself to supply whole cards of them.

Surely their bosses (the bookmakers) would prefer some extra 14-runner, 0-60 handicaps instead.
 
That's all well and good if you can attract 14 runner fields - seen the card for Kempton tomorrow? The biggest field is 12; the rest of the field sizes being 10 (x2), 8, 7, 6 and 5 runners. Lingfield has had to reopen 3 races for Saturday's card as two of the handicaps have attracted 6 and 7 entries, the conditions race 9 entries.

Extra fixtures are not purely to produce a betting product - they are also supposed to provide additional opportunities to replace the races lost through abandonment. There will be plenty of bumper horses sitting in boxes at the moment with trainers looking to get a race into them.

Kri, I was only reporting what Barney Clifford had said. IIRC he also said that it took a period of hours to harrow the track to the deepness required for NH horses.
 
This 'extra' meeting at Lingfield is to compensate for the lost NH card, though - it's not in addition to it, and it probably saves the bumper or bumpers they were going to run then. I'm sure bookies would prefer 12 races of 0-60 handicaps stuffed to the max, as often as possible - and yes, bumpers aren't a huge attraction betting-wise, but sometimes one just has to consider the non-betting picture, such as getting horses introduced to courses so that they can go on to provide future betting fodder for the ever-open maw of bookmaking and exchanges.

Shadz, wasn't disputing anything - just that I was unaware of your previous effort. I'll ask Neil, if we do ever get back to Lingfield before March (!) how long it takes and how deep it has to be. I wouldn't have thought that much deeper, would you?
 
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I can't remember the figures he quoted but it was something like (I think!!!!) harrowing to 1 inch for flat racing and about 4 inches for NH horses. Apparently it takes some time to harrow to such a depth but it probably also depends on the surface - Lingfield's surface may well be deeper anyway or something.
 
Put on a host of class 6 and 7 handicaps from 5f to 1m and you'll have no problem whatsoever with getting 14-runner fields.
 
Well (she says, sarkily), there's bugger-all point in putting on the very nice Listeds on the AW, just to see three horses turn up from the biggest yards, to grab the prize money. Every time I see someone belittling the fare on offer, whether it's on AW or turf, I'd like them to have a pop back at the trainers who can't be bothered to at least try to compete against John Gosden, Mark Johnston, Saeed, or Sir Bloody. Lingfield puts on some darn nice better-quality races, and hey-ho, all we see are the same four/five trainers and that many horses. I'm tired of hearing how much low-ranking racing there is, be it Flat or NH, and then seeing match races or 3-runner circuses when the pot goes into five chunky figures.
 
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