- This topic has 42 replies, 26 voices, and was last updated 10 years, 5 months ago by
.
- Posts
In the immortal words of C.M. Burns, what in blazes are you talking about?
Read again more thoroughly!
BUY THE SUN
I enjoy watching them on the telly but used to feel aggrieved having the Festival one on the only day that we tend to go, especially as we miss the last race of the day so we can get out of the car park in less that 2 hours.
I don’t want to sound negative either but Garde Champetre and Spotthedifference would have to be declared with their pension books, being 16 and 22 respectively! The French x-country is really challenging, Cheltenham is a bit of a joke in comparison.
Garde Champetre never reached 16, having been killed in the 2012 Cheltenham Cross Country race. I’d have thought that was as much challenge as anyone would need!
I like the variety that the Cross country brings from a viewing perspective but appreciate that it has limited punting appeal as there are so few races of this type per year (3 in the UK, 5 or 6 in Ireland). It also allows certain horses (Uncle Junior being a prime example) to prolong their careers into the veteran stage and while I’d be quite happy for a few more XC races per year this is unlikely unless Cheltenham expand their XC programme as I would imagine the cost to create and maintain such a course is quite prohibitive.
To the earlier post suggesting that an XC course would be a good complement to the Hunter Chase evening in late April/early May, I had this thought myself but I presume this has not been proposed due to a lack of watering facilities on the XC track which means that there is a high possibility of abandonment most years due to Firm/Hard going at that time of year.
Well as an interest have a few quid each way on the old fella UNCLE JUNIOR .
It was going well when he slipped up last time out.Cheltenham needs to take a leaf out of the French version of cross country racing, I have even compiled standard times for some courses how I achieved this is beyond me.
<iframe width=”1170″ height=”878″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/o5Vu4PBove8?feature=oembed” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen=””></iframe>
Matron, not for me. This is what I got when I clicked to quote your post.
Blackgold…….it looks like you’re clicking on the ‘Quote’ that’s underneath the post you want to quote
You should be clicking on the ‘Quote’ that’s above it !
The cross country races are all part of the rich tapestry of a race meeting and, although the purists may hate them, they can be entertaining and have created plenty of course specialists.
I like watching them on television and never cease to marvel at how the jockeys and, not least, the commentators manage to sort them out and make sense of the winding and complicated routes, even with the aid of markers and possibly an atlas and a compass.
They are definitely an acquired taste but it would be a pity to scrap them because of the snobbery and contempt of the people who think they have no place on a “proper” race card, especially at a prestigious meeting.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.