The Moving Race Pantomime 2010-11

S

stodge

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Saturday's Newcastle card is lost and before anyone can breathe, Nicky Henderson starts bleating about moving the race to the Newbury card. Yes, ideal for him - a nice Conditions race run just down the road for BINOCULAR and his other runners.

I'm delighted the BHA aren't playing this game but the siren calls to run the race at Sandown will be irresisistible so a northern-based race run on a left-hand track will instead be run on a right-handed track in the south.

Laughable :mad:

It COULD be run at Doncaster on the 11th or at the northern meeting on the 4th (Wetherby?) or even at the next Newcastle meeting on the 19th.

Having seen some of the farcical re-routing of races in recent years pandering to powerful yards, racecourses or the interests of television, I just hope the BHA and others show a little mettle and at least try to preserve some semblance of the race in its original form.
 
You're making a rather big assumption about future weather conditions north of the border, Stodge! Isn't it better to just hack on and stage the race when and where you know it can be run, even if it doesn't meet a purist's requirements, than hang about and see if the future meetings take place at all? This way, grabbing the weather while it's still relatively kind, sees it take place, rather than possibly be lost until the New Year. Or maybe March, if last year's anything to go by! :(
 
Wetherby would be a goer but isn't this part of a bonus series Stodge which also includes a race at Cheltenham next month?

11th would be too close to the Cheltenham meet the following weekend - would say Sandown is the most likely outcome as the BHA will want it televised and Channel 4 will want it at the main meeting so Henderson will probably get his way in part.

Agree it should be run at a Northern meeting if possible though and a track as similar as possible to Newcastle.
 
Fairyhouse decided to move the 2mile race on Sunday, which Kimberlite King is due to run in, to Saturday so that the 3m5f race on Saturday could be run after the Drinmore. Something about not wanting to ruin the ground for the Drinmore horses. Problem now is that they are claiming the Sat card is going to be canned to ensure racing on Sunday. So we are not going to get a run at all!! Brilliant!!
 
Cantoris said:
Fairyhouse decided to move the 2mile race on Sunday, which Kimberlite King is due to run in, to Saturday so that the 3m5f race on Saturday could be run after the Drinmore. Something about not wanting to ruin the ground for the Drinmore horses. Problem now is that they are claiming the Sat card is going to be canned to ensure racing on Sunday. So we are not going to get a run at all!! Brilliant!!
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Thought of Kimberlite the second I heard the news - doesn't that just make you wanna puke!
 
LUKE said:
Did Punjabi beat Sublimity at Wetherby a couple of years ago -was that a rearranged Fighting Fifth.
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Yes. No snow this far inland up this way,frost would be only problem staging it at Wetherby but looks the obvious choice to me,no biase in my decision of course:p

Also,as far as I am aware,when I was there Wednesday for the racing, there were no casualties in regards injuries which was a positive point.
 
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Dont see the problem if it goes south - putting it on this weekend at a venue where there will already be a good crowd makes perfect sense to me. Delaying it a week to keep it 'local' makes no sense at all.
 
BlazingWalker said:
Yes. No snow this far inland up this way,frost would be only problem staging it at Wetherby but looks the obvious choice to me,no biase in my decision of course:p

Also,as far as I am aware,when I was there Wednesday for the racing, there were no casualties in regards injuries which was a positive point.
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Sadly there was,Calfraz in the opener.

There have been more positive comments regarding the ground there though.
 
Appalling Decision...

A predictably awful decision confiming my belief that NH racing is run for the benefit of a few well-connected wealthy Owners and Trainers. Nicky Henderson has got what amounts to a piece of paid work for BINOCULAR while the poor trainer of ORSIPPIUS is left without a chance to run in a Group 1 because of a short-sighted decision.

Some of the comments on here beggar belief - the presence of the Fighting Fifth substitute race won't add a single person to the crowd. Hennessy day is a fine day with a fine card - it didn't need or warrant anything extra but for those whose NH horizons extend no further than "Festivals" or the Champagne Bar, another good race is a welcome bonus.

There is plenty of redundancy built into the NH season - the Bula and the Christmas Hurdle are perfectly adequate races for aspiring two-mile Champion hurdlers. The redundancy is there because we live in a climate which sometimes prevents racing. Thirty or forty years ago, Trainers managed without the rescheduling of races or even all-weather gallops.

As a Trainer (allegedly), the likes of Henderson should be able to deal with the vagaries of the climate and adjust his training schedule accordingly so that bringing BINOCULAR to a race a week or two later shouldn't be a problem but he wants to run NOW and he is too weak a trainer and knows he is too influential not to argue for something entirely in his own self-interest even if it tramples all over the smaller Trainers and Owners up north.

NO race is important enough to be preserved at all costs and the Fighting Fifth is one out of a whole pattern of Conditions hurdles run at differing tracks and probably differing ground conditions throughout the winter.

It COULD have been a real gesture to run the race at a smaller track midweek and given the likes of Catterick a real boost but as usual the BHA has caved in to the vested interests of NH racing - wealthy Owners, over-powerful Trainers and of course television.

Paul Struthers has again showed total weakness when confronted by those who really run racing and in particular NH racing.
 
Even if you disagree, how on earth is this an "awful" decision?

Its hardly the end of the world is it?

As it happens, i think its excellent quick action and whilst the paranoids can think what they like about Henderson, the big races do not get moved to Fakenham on a Thursday. Rightly so
 
I do have some sympathy with your argument Stodge of running the FF at a northern track in December sometime but timing seems to be key to me rather than place. Moving the date of the race will mean clashes with other big days like the Boylesports meeting at Cheltenham perhaps.
As for your comments re: N Henderson, I find his interviews and his quotes most unhelpful and still feel a bit peeved about Binocular and the Champion Hurdle last season but there is no doubt in my mind he is a very good trainer of horses.
 
stodge said:
Nicky Henderson has got what amounts to a piece of paid work for BINOCULAR while the poor trainer of ORSIPPIUS is left without a chance to run in a Group 1 because of a short-sighted decision.
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Can you explain the Orsippius bit to me. Why can't he run?

Races, particularly pattern ones, should be protected. Most view these races simply as gambling opportunities but having them well spaced is important. For example, Binocular will use it as a stepping stone to the Crimbo hurdle. Run it in December and where does Binocular go for a run while also taking in Crimbo? Timing of races is everything, just look at Big Zeb.
 
stodge said:
Some of the comments on here beggar belief - the presence of the Fighting Fifth substitute race won't add a single person to the crowd. Hennessy day is a fine day with a fine card - it didn't need or warrant anything extra but for those whose NH horizons extend no further than "Festivals" or the Champagne Bar, another good race is a welcome bonus.
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I think you're wide of the mark here - having barely missed a Hennessy in nearly twenty years, I feel qualified to comment! There is a largely NH crowd there, a lot of them purists; to many the Hennessy meeting is one of the biggest deals of the year, it being so close to Lambourn and the racing communities both within and surrounding its boundaries. The Hennessy to many is a race they long to win due to its local links - I can say myself that I long to own or train a horse to win the Hennessy before any other race. Of course at such a large occasion it is inevitable that there will be people there who go for the social more than the racing but to belittle the Hennessy meeting by implying most of the crowd are there purely for that simply isn't true.

Oh, and why in the name of God would anyone want to run it at Catterick????
 
Stodge, would you be so heated if Nicky H wasn't Nicky H but a really small-time trainer who spoke with a regional accent, wore a flat 'at and britches, but had a horse of BINOCULAR's quality? Sorry, your post reeks of class warfare rather than a desire to see a top race held, even if out of its usual context.

Suppose that the Grand Military was going to be snowed out, but Haydock was available? Why not save a great, traditional race and still use a very good course to host it, rather than lose it?

You've had a go at Henderson because he has rich owners (as if that's inherently abhorrent), you've had a go at the north-south divide (bit 1950s, surely?) and you've had a go at social racegoers, who probably form a good 60% of racing any time, anywhere. Can I suggest a nice mug of Horlicks and a digestive biscuit before you implode?
 
I think Stodge is more worried about the Fighting Fifth being permanently re-routed from Newcastle. It is a top-notch race and the nature of it would be lost if permanently transferred to another track such as Wetherby or Catterick, as it has always been viewed as a trial for Cheltenham due to the undulations and uphill finish.

The moving of the Fighting Fifth to a Southern track would not only deprive the North of a major hurdle race, but also part of local heritage, being named after the local regiment (as Thommo tells us every year).

By all means transfer if weather conditions are adverse, but a permanent removal would mean giving in to commercial pressures, rather than honouring and preserving the roots and history of NH racing.
 
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