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Have you ever heard such rubbish? For people to suggest Frankel’s race should have been slotted in to the half time interval in a micky mouse play off match is a joke.
In fact I thought Chapman was joking when he first mentioned it but he wasn’t and Sean Boyce, Big Mac and Duval all seemed to agree today.
It’s the daftest suggestion I’ve heard for a long time.
No it is just a realization of how the British sporting public’s loyalties are placed. The "Lockinge" doesn’t have quite the same gravitas as the Grand National (which tends to be scheduled to run at half time nowadays), the Derby (which was moved in 1996 because of a football match) or the Arc. It would have also ensured that the race took place in the tea interval for the test match at Lords. What it suggests is that it was not considered important enough to try and maximize the potential audience.
It’s garbage. I’m sure anyone with any interest in racing could switch chanels for 90 seconds during matches, regardless of who was playing. Incase the pander to football brigade hadn’t noticed, there’s matches and racing on at the same time every Saturday and racing does alright. Do these people think that if there was no football on that everyone would all of a sudden just switch to watching horses ?
It happens in Australia when black caviar was running after a football match there were coaches taking people straight to the race track to see her that’s where they got that from.
It’s perfect logic, there was a thread recently about a quiz question and how the general public’s knowledge or interest in racing is zero, we all know how much bad publicity racing gets and causes itself.
Just for once, when we have a potential superstar horse we can’t be bothered to give people the best chance to see it.
Not many people will have switched over yesterday and no pubs would have done so for fear of a riot – chance missed, another own goal by racing.
Yes, but moving races around to "accommodate" football is only pandering to those who think there is no sport except football. The majority of football fans aren’t and never will be interested in racing, they’ll only go out to the kitchen for another beer while the race is on. If people want to see a race then let them miss a few minutes of watching overpaid prima donas knocking a ball about. It won’t kill them and there’ll be plenty of replays of any goals they happened to miss.
Upon reflection, it probably has nothing to do with any other sporting event. The advertising revenue generated by "Who wants to be a millionaire for dummies" aka "Deal or No Deal" probably gives it priority in programme scheduling.
The non-racing public have no context within which to judge a horserace. You can tell them Frankel’s the best in the world but what they see is a horse which looks pretty much like any other, beating a handful of other horses.
They’d probably watch a 16 runner selling plate with more interest and be none the wiser regarding the difference.
I think it should have happened the other way round. As soon as the gates opened the ref should have blown the whistle and all the players and fans should have turned to the big screen to see the wonderhorse strut his stuff. Then you simply have a drop ball.
"this perfect mix of poetry and destruction, this glory of rhythm, power and majesty: the undisputed champion of the world!!!"
NBC actually made the NHL schedule their first playoff game to start at 10:30 in the morning so that it wouldn’t conflict with Kentucky Derby coverage.
As has been pointed out many times before while racecourses are not averse to screening football matches the opposite can be true of actually showing racing from other meetings.
Apparently this was the case at Newbury yesterday according to Big Mac & Co this morning where they failed to show any of the racing from the other tracks, quite bizarre.
If I want to see a football match I wouldn’t be going to the races to watch it, it may be a surprise for some but a lot of people going racing actually want to see horse racing.
A laughable suggestion that any racing fan should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves for making.
For starters the gigantic clash of Blackpool v West Ham was confined to a subscription channel, quite often these matches start late to maximise advertising revenue, what if there was an injury or incident leading to several minutes of injury time."Hang on for a few minutes more Frankel down at the start while they’re completing the first half in the massive Div 1 play off"
As well as causing total chaos to the rest of the races that afternoon.
Go **** yourselves idiots for making such a stupid suggestion.
Let racing worry about racing not other sports.
All that football fans are interested in at half time is going down the steps for a p!ss and and pie.
If people’s at home then they got sky+ etc.
How do you think I coped the t’other day when the Snooker, football, cricket and racing was all on a Saturday?
If it’s an idea to entice new people, like another member said ‘Frankel’ is the same as a class 5 horse in their eyes winning just another race.
Gaelic Warrior Gold Cup Winner 2026
And that ladies and gentlemen is why racing will always be a marginalised sport that the general public will either ignore, look down upon or be happy to see banned.
They (the general public) will look on racing as that thing that strange so and so bets/loses on, it’s a mugs game, cruel to animals, full of corruption, etc.
They will only ever see a racecourse if it is part of a works day out, party or maybe because they’re going to see a band there.
It doesn’t always have to be the same – racing could just for once look at how it is perceived generally and try to gear it’s PR machine towards improving it’s public image.
As has been pointed out many times before while racecourses are not averse to screening football matches the opposite can be true of actually showing racing from other meetings.
Apparently this was the case at Newbury yesterday according to Big Mac & Co this morning where they failed to show any of the racing from the other tracks, quite bizarre.
I was at Thirsk on Saturday and they did show the Lockinge, with commentary over the PA – they even included the Lockinge card in their racecard.
Good for Thirsk at least they try
NBC actually made the NHL schedule their first playoff game to start at 10:30 in the morning so that it wouldn’t conflict with Kentucky Derby coverage.
Yeah it’s called marketing something British racing know bog all about.
This thread just throws my mind back to when Zenyatta was running and the amazing coverage going world wide,even attracting people to the course who had never seen a racehorse in their lives.
Here we are on the verge of Frankel becoming the greatest horse Europe has even seen and Billy the Blackpool supporter doesn’t even now he exists.
UK racing should be doing everything the could to entice Black Caviar to take on Frankel in the Sussex and promoting it.
It should have been arranged already at whatever cost and promoted as the biggest thing since War Admiral V Sea Buscuit and TV veiwers, Cinema goers, radio listeners and any one who can read should be sick to the teeth hearing about it.
Alas even if it happens it will get 30 seconds on the news after the event and that will be that.
I was at Thirsk on Saturday and they did show the Lockinge, with commentary over the PA – they even included the Lockinge card in their racecard.
I can’t imagine, even here, there was a racecourse that failed to show the race.
How much of the other racing from Newbury & Newmarket did they show at Thirsk?
I’ve heard Mark Johnston state before he’s found it nigh on impossible many times to watch his other runners at away tracks.
It’s plainly ridiculous away meetings aren’t freely available to watch for racegoers.
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