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Does anyone happen to know if the running rail at Goodwood was moved out yesterday? I understand it was moved by 20m last Saturday.
Rail was in the same position as Saturday adding about 1.25 secs to all times on the round course due to extra distance travelled. (Slightly less in terms of time on Thurs due to faster ground).
Yes Skallywag,
The rail was out by far enough to allow those trapped against the rail to find room. Rail coming to an end 1 1/2 furlongs from home.
This may well make it easier for those in behind to get a run, but it will make a difference to the way I work races out. Front runners don’t have the advantage on the round course they once did.
Also, are they going to keep this rail there for every meeting?
Will punters know in advance if the rail is going to be dolled out?
How much is this going to effect the times?
I see Richard has already answered the final question.Ginge
Value Is EverythingStrangely enough I e-mailed Newmarket to suggest they did exactly the same thing, after Six Perfections lost her Guineas.
Thank god they did not do as I wanted this year. I backed Natagora.
Seriously, it would help stop the problem of not getting a run.
I did get a reply saying they did not have enough plastic rail to go right to the 1m2f pole.
Ginge
Value Is EverythingThanks for your help guys.
Information about the moving of running rails seems to be widely available on-course to jockeys & trainers & elsewhere to a select few but doesn’t always make it to a wider audience. Given that it has the effect of changing the advertised race conditions, is there not a case for such information being published on, say, the BHB website?
Thanks for your help guys.
Information about the moving of running rails seems to be widely available on-course to jockeys & trainers & elsewhere to a select few but doesn’t always make it to a wider audience. Given that it has the effect of changing the advertised race conditions, is there not a case for such information being published on, say, the BHB website?
Salisbury used to favour those drawn high when going was not soft. However, when the largest field of the day does not exceed 14, a false rail now goes in. This seems to dramatically reduce the draw advantage. It also has an effect of races being run over further than advertised.
Though give Jeremy Martin his due, he does try to publicise the change.Ginge
Value Is EverythingRichard, was the information you provided (on RUK) about the rail position and likely effect on the race times provided from an official source or your own opinion?
The fact the railing out required an extra 20m (or two sections of running rail) came from the clerk of the course. The rest is just maths based on covering an extra 1/10th of a furlong.
Thanks Richard. It would be nice to have this information available officially for every meeting.
Why do the Clerks not move the start position to compensate for rail movements?
TO be honest I think it is because they are only approximate distances to begin with (which is of course also wrong).
Overseas they have several standard rail positions and starts are moved accordingly but here it is all rather haphazard and imprecise.
The answer in the BHA Q and A on the site about the wrist band is interesting and would love to see some of the actual distances it produces over existing trips.TO be honest I think it is because they are only approximate distances to begin with
Richard,
I was informed by the BHA that the starting positions for flat races are surveyed in and accurate to within one yard.
It’s interesting to note that the clerk at Haydock is able to tell you how much the race distance has been changed by running rail movements, e.g., for the recent Saturday evening meeting, 1m 30yd became 1m 50yd. This is much more useful that merely stating that the rail has been moved by x metres & it should become standard procedure to make this level of information widely available.
scallywag76, was the information from Haydock published or in an RUK interview?
If all flat race distances were accurate I would take more note of times/speed figures.
From a personal communication, Wallace.
Assuming the info. from the BHA is correct – and I’ve no reason to assume that isn’t the case – then the only variation in distance will arise when running rails are moved, so in many instances the advertised distances are highly accurate.
Aside from the usual arguments that are trotted out about the usefulness, or otherwise, of time-based ratings in the UK you need to be sure that the integrity of the ratings you use is as watertight as possible in all respects. This certainly isn’t the case with many of those that are readily available and the reason why I chose to calculate my own – time consuming but worth the effort.
Personally after the number of discrepancies that have been shown up in recent years I would require a great deal of convincing about the accuracy of that BHA comment.
If it were true when it was done we surely would have seen wholesale changes to race distances at virtually every track, or moving of start positions and I certainly don’t remember either of those things happening.Also Haydock of course are the track that ran the Betfair Chase over 3m on the same track with the fancies replacing hurdles as Millennium Royal had just won a 2 m 7 1/2f hcap from the same start.
They subsequently revised up the hurdles distance which only compounded the error as the it was the chase course not the hurdles track that had moved.
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