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In those days I regularly visited both Redcar and Newcastle. I seem to recall seeing Rheingold the Arc winner start his 3YO career at Teeside. Now it is nearly all dross at Redcar and Newcastle and Teeside is long gone.
Quote: from apracing on 9:55 am on Jan. 24, 2007[br]<br>Hard to believe now, but in the early 60’s, Redcar used to stage the most valuable handicap of the entire season, the Vaux Gold Tankard.
In 1964 it was worth £72,500, more than the Ebor, Northumberland Plate, Chester Cup etc.
AP<br>
<br>AP, that seems an incredible amount of money for a handicap in 1964, would be a decent pot now, must be the equivalent of around a million now. It must have been the richest race of the season, more than The Derby etc. Is it correct?
Quote: from graysonscolumn on 9:38 am on Jan. 24, 2007[br]Are you all going to tell to Drone that Redcar ain’t in Yorkshire these days or shall I? ;)
Pedant<br>(graysonscolumn)
Oh yes it is Pedant. Thankfully the nouveau-county of Cleveland was abolished c.ten years ago along with Humberside and Avon, and Redcar has returned to it’s historic home in Yorkshire.
What we need next is three Ridings and the likes of Brecknockshire and Kirkcudbrightshire reinstating, and all will be well in the Union.
The Local Government Act (1972) was cultural vandalism at it’s worst.
Enjoy your Sunday in Roxburghshire
<br>Yeats,
That prize money figure is quoted in a book about British racecourses edited by the man that does the ‘Ask the Anorak’ column in the Post.
I’ve no reason to doubt it, but I don’t have a 1964 form book that I could use to confirm it.
AP
Quote: from Lingfield on 10:07 pm on Jan. 23, 2007[br]Redcar’s racing is nothing special with only a two year old trophy and the Zetland Gold Cup featuring amongst the mediocrity.<br>Whilst I too detest the sandpits, average field size at Redcar  last season was 12.<br>I wouldn’t be sorry to see it tarmaced over.<br> Good to see the north taking its share of development after the destruction wrought on the south by Prescott’s enforced housing developments. <br>
Why don’t you just tarmac everything that has racing for horses rated less than 80??? – Points of view like this make me think… Is Lingfield the kind of person who – if he/she was an owner – would just leave their horse out in the field if it didn’t reach something above average ability???
Quote: from Drone on 8:37 pm on Jan. 24, 2007[br]
Quote: from graysonscolumn on 9:38 am on Jan. 24, 2007[br]Are you all going to tell to Drone that Redcar ain’t in Yorkshire these days or shall I? ;)
Pedant<br>(graysonscolumn)
Oh yes it is Pedant. Thankfully the nouveau-county of Cleveland was abolished c.ten years ago along with Humberside and Avon, and Redcar has returned to it’s historic home in Yorkshire.
What we need next is three Ridings and the likes of Brecknockshire and Kirkcudbrightshire reinstating, and all will be well in the Union.
The Local Government Act (1972) was cultural vandalism at it’s worst.
Enjoy your Sunday in Roxburghshire<br>
<br>Scoring draw on closer inspection, perhaps. It counts as a member of the "ceremonial county" of North Yorkshire nowadays, but hardly any of Redcar & Cleveland’s administration, services and amenities have been re-absorbed into North Yorks – e.g. I left the library service in North Yorks only at the back end of 2003 and R & C was still regarded as very much a separate entity where that provision was concerned.
gc<br>
Adoptive father of two. The patron saint of lower-grade fare. A gently critical friend of point-to-pointing. Kindness is a political act.
Sedgefield have gone cold on the AW idea, chaps, due to passionate opposition from annual members, environmentalists, bemused carrot crunchers and Miss Sedgefield 2006 who reckons the whole caper is a bad idea, apparently.
Don’t worry everyone. It looks increasingly likely that Mr Pipe, Leonard Lungo and young Mr Richards will continue to send out long odds-on winning hurdlers with 54lb in hand.
A solution? A new 1m 6f Polytrack/Fibresand hybrid oval at the new Redcar supercourse might be ideal for northern based trainers and punters desperate for somewhat more competitive racing to pass away a winter afternoon. ÂÂÂ
What a great idea!!:biggrin: I love a compromise.
Quote: from Maxilon 5 on 12:36 am on Jan. 25, 2007[br]
Don’t worry everyone. It looks increasingly likely that Mr Pipe, Leonard Lungo and young Mr Richards will continue to send out long odds-on winning hurdlers with 54lb in hand.
Nah, John Wade’s yer man at Sludgers.
"That prize money figure is quoted in a book about British racecourses edited by the man that does the ‘Ask the Anorak’ column in the Post.
I’ve no reason to doubt it, but I don’t have a 1964 form book that I could use to confirm it.
AP"
Rare example of John Randall getting something wrong then, because that doesn’t tally with the form book.  It was the richest handicap in Europe at around that time, but in 1964 it carried a purse of £12,750 – about £10k to the winner.  The Derby in that year had an added value of about £50k.
I hope Redcar doesn’t close, partly because I’m a sentimental old softie, and partly because building brand new racecourses doesn’t seem to be going too well at the moment.<br>
Vaux Gold Tankard.<br> For what it’s worth, Farm Walk won 9 races including the 1967 Vaux Gold tankard yet only accumulated career winning prize money of £20,447. (And that includes his Magnet Cup bunce).
Quote: from Sailing Shoes on 11:22 pm on Jan. 24, 2007[br]
Quote: from Lingfield on 10:07 pm on Jan. 23, 2007[br]Redcar’s racing is nothing special with only a two year old trophy and the Zetland Gold Cup featuring amongst the mediocrity.<br>Whilst I too detest the sandpits, average field size at Redcar  last season was 12.<br>I wouldn’t be sorry to see it tarmaced over.<br> Good to see the north taking its share of development after the destruction wrought on the south by Prescott’s enforced housing developments. <br>
Why don’t you just tarmac everything that has racing for horses rated less than 80??? – Points of view like this make me think… Is Lingfield the kind of person who – if he/she was an owner – would just leave their horse out in the field if it didn’t reach something above average ability???<br>
My point was too much racing,too many poor horses in training, too much mediocrity, too much dross, too many struggling trainers and jockeys not up to it, all largely at the behest of the off course betting industry. Perpetuated by tracks like Redcar.For one of the most soulless experiences of you life try a twilight fixture at Kempton AW- grim facade, no crowd, no atmosphere, no rails bookies. What’s the point? No wonder some of the newspapers have dropped publishing cards and Great Leighs hasn’t arrived yet!<br>If I was rich enough to own a thoroughbred racehorse in training which turned out to be a slowboat I’d get rid of it rather than have it with a small time trainer and scratch around the gaffes for peanuts prize money supplemented by laying and backing it based on inside info. to maintain the family pet.
<br>Apologies to John Randall – I was away from home and working from memory for my last post. The book is called ‘Racecourses On The Flat’, and written by John Tyrrel, not Randall.
Clearly the figure given in this book is wrong, or possibly I’ve misread the meaning.
The exact wording is -"The Vaux Gold Tankard, first run in 1959, was for a time Europe’s richest handicap, and the level of prize money, which stood at £8,450 in 1946, had become £72,550 by 1964."
Reading that again, I think the figures probably refer to the total prize money for the season, not for the Vaux Gold Tankard alone.
Apologies for the misleading post.
AP
Quote: from Drone on 8:30 am on Jan. 25, 2007[br]
Quote: from Maxilon 5 on 12:36 am on Jan. 25, 2007[br]
Don’t worry everyone. It looks increasingly likely that Mr Pipe, Leonard Lungo and young Mr Richards will continue to send out long odds-on winning hurdlers with 54lb in hand.
Nah, John Wade’s yer man at Sludgers.<br>
Yes everyone knows that the highlight of summer jumping is not the Summer Plate at Market Rasen, it’s not the valuable chase at Newton Abbot. It isn’t even the Summer National at Uttoxeter.
It is of course the what used to be the John Wade Skip Hire Premier Selling Hurdle, run this year as the ‘John Wade For Equine Fibre and Rubber Premier Selling Handicap Hurdle’, won this year by Moyne Pleasure after a power-packed finish from Kenny Johnson who had typically taken the widest of courses throughout!
<br>It must be a source of great frustration to you that the horses you buy out of sellers to aim at this prestigious highlight of the Sedgefield calendar, keep ending up too high in the ratings to be able to participate.
AP
Quote: from davidjohnson on 7:44 pm on Jan. 25, 2007[br]
It is of course the what used to be the John Wade Skip Hire Premier Selling Hurdle, run this year as the ‘John Wade For Equine Fibre and Rubber Premier Selling Handicap Hurdle’, won this year by Moyne Pleasure after a power-packed finish from Kenny Johnson who had typically taken the widest of courses throughout! <br>
Being a chase afficionado I’d rather have the ‘John Wade for Equine Fibre and Rubber Selling Handicap Chase’ won, trained and owned by the sponsor with Shulmin on his chase debut and well backed, as JW’s so often are.
Got a soft spot for Devil’s Run, who’s done me a few favours though, sad to relate, I neglected to back him when an 18/1 winner at Ayr a month or so ago.
In all seriousness, a capable trainer as I think AP was alluding to.
Quote: from Maxilon 5 on 12:36 am on Jan. 25, 2007[br]<br>A solution? A new 1m 6f Polytrack/Fibresand hybrid oval at the new Redcar supercourse might be ideal for northern based trainers and punters desperate for somewhat more competitive racing to pass away a winter afternoon.  <br>
<br>Who needs an oval? There is a beach next door to the current track which many trainers in the area already use to exercise their strings. My old pal Geoff Sanderson, former assistant trainer of Quixall Crossett, always referred to it rather fabulously as Nad Al Redcar.
Jeremy<br>(graysonscolumn)<br>
(Edited by graysonscolumn at 9:41 pm on Jan. 25, 2007)
Adoptive father of two. The patron saint of lower-grade fare. A gently critical friend of point-to-pointing. Kindness is a political act.
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