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Lots of bleating about derisory prize money at present. Ludlow present a very nicely endowed card and get hardly any runners.I know there may have been concerns about watered ground but a midweek 13k handicap chase surely deserves better than 6 less than stellar runners
With prize-money a hot topic, what a fantastic effort from @KelsoRacecourse tomorrow. A total of £163,011 (including Grade 2/Listed races worth £60k and £50k) is up for grabs, more than Doncaster and Newbury and without recourse to the safety blanket of bookmaker sponsorship.
37 declarations.
Is Doncaster under this Lingfield ARC protest as there barely 2 place races this afternoon and no 3 place races
Apparently, Kelso are pretty upset about the low turnout although I’m not entirely sure why. Looking through their card, I wouldn’t feel hard done by had I made the journey to attend.
The first race, a Class 4 novice hurdle, has a Nicholls French import making his UK debut and a McCain point winner. All six runners in the following novice handicap chase have won this season. The Premier Chase has one of last season’s leading novices, a former Grand National winner, the conqueror of Definitely Red over C&D last time and an improving NTD novice. The Premier Hurdle has a legitimate G1 novice in Getaway Trump and three useful novices to keep him honest. The remaining races are somewhat uninspiring but at least the last two handicaps have horses who can make the running so the prospect of a falsely run race is somewhat mitigated.
Furthermore, put into context, Kelso is comparatively in the arse end of nowhere and will be competing with Doncaster for reasons which make little sense. Also, the Northern (let alone Scottish) scene is pretty threadbare as illustrated by the fact that there are just three northern trained horses entered in novices at the festival (Mega Yeats, Off The Hook, Highland Hunter) so to get the fields they have is pretty good going.
I can see why the bookies would be disappointed but they’re not even sponsoring any of tomorrow’s Kelso races so who cares. But from a purist’s perspective, I’d be happier with tomorrow’s races than have them inflated with deadwood.
If you have runners in the lesser money races 7k to winner, the expenses may not be worth the effort if you don’t win. It cost us 600 round trip from Somerset to Southwell plus all other ex’s. Transport is a big expense for owners plus overnight costs all round – not surprising really.
The explanation is that the BHA put on a number of extra meetings 18-28 Feb to compensate for the running opportunities lost by the suspension of racing due to equine flu. However, by the latter range of the time period in which these extra fixtures took place the going had in general turned from Soft to Good, some horses were still not ready to run after having boosters, for others it was too close to targets, and the BHA may have overestimated the amount required in the first place. Therefore, whether a meeting was an extra one or one originally on the calendar some have suffered, regardless of prize money (ironically given the current dispute).
Anyone have any figures to show if ARC really are taking the p*ss with reduced contributions to prizemoney?
Have to be honest in that I don’t really trust a lot of what ARC comes out with in this matter, if they had taken this decision after April when they would have had tangible evidence of how media rights income has been affected by the stake reduction on FOBTs then maybe you could see their point.
This all smacks of them trying to get away with paying out as little as possible and thinking that the industry would grumble about it for a while but take it on the chin and move on with business as usual. The fact that they were able to do a temporary deal just several days into the entries boycott started doesn’t paint them in a very good light to me.
I don’t pretend to know the answer to this complex issue but I can tell you one thing, Ralph Beckett has gone down in my estimation.
Trying to bully small trainers and hard up jockeys is disgusting, let’s see if he tries the same tactic with Godolphin.
I’m sure he, and many others, will have miraculously changed their mind by Good Friday anyway…
Is that who’s name was blanked out on the screenshots of the whatsapp group suggesting blacklisting the jockeys who took rides?
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