I finally got there yesterday.
Luckily E P Harty had a runner so he pressed owner badges into Grey 's and my paws so we had a wander through the majestic new stand, or what was available to us.
First thing to notice was the level of security ; three levels to be exact.
The basis of the Irish Racing Experience is the lack of formality, the absence of a them and us and the nonsense that racehorses are offended by brown shoes in The member's Enclosure.
Thankfully management have not enforced the shoe rule (yet) but the rest has been enforced.
The security at Members' lounge outnumbered the members; their function might have been to keep members in as much as to keep the rest of us out.
We sat in the second level 200 Euro seats and were lucky to have each other for company.
There are enough non reserved seats for most meetings thankfully as was evident yesterday.
When the wind picked up it blew through the stand like a banshee, angered that the opening ceremony was performed by a non racing taoiseach as opposed to the Bishop of Kildare, ( or even Cashel as might be appropriate).
They've picked up on a number of the issues that I commented on from the first day, but this remains the biggest issue. Vast swathes of near empty facilities up top, with the majority packed in at the bottom. On Saturday, with only a smidge of light drizzle it was coming in on top of us. Lovely prospect on a proper wet day. Even in the bottom tier, there are far too many unused seats set aside. They have to open that part up.
Not surprised the members numbers are down. They had a loyal bunch who stuck by them when they inflicted a building site on us and still they tried to fleece us. No thanks.
The wind noise was interesting on Sunday. I thought maybe they'd opened up the train track again and put it right under the stand.
You'll be pleased to hear, more food options are now available but still not enough space for tables and chairs. Imagine paying over the odds for food (albeit it's nice) and having to stand and eat it off a tray while waiting for a space.
But still, I go, for as ever the action on the track. That bit I really do enjoy. Personally, I couldn't go on Friday so was disappointed that the Marble Hill and Gallinule were moved there. I'd take them any day of the week over poor handicaps, but acknowledge I'm maybe in a minority there. Four poor enough handicaps on Sunday held little interest. Punting woes summed up by my hoss in the 2nd seeming set to overcome the draw bias only to be stopped by a loose horse in the shadow of the post.
Both classics were worthy of the name and had good depth but it did seem to pay to be prominent. All bar Frankie had a good nap in the Ridgewood Pearl (Moore and Doyle particularly culpable) as the Italian rode them to sleep and even I could see that coming after 2 furlongs. Shocking from the others. A good spread of winners in the smaller races for trainers not usually associated with HQ. Of course the Tatts was little more than a gallop for the beautiful Magical. Not her fault if no one wants to play and interesting to look through the recent history and see that perhaps the quality has, in the main, been better than given credit for.
They have some serious product there, if only they knew what to do with it.
