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Friend of mine was "working" at Chepstow last Monday, he was telling me yesterday of the farce of a meeting that took place.
Six races, 30 runners, five fences per circuit and two hurdles on each circuit omitted.
He was speaking to an "official" who more or less confirmed that racing would have been off if it hadn’t been a Bank Holiday and that they had sold 1500 ticketss in advance.
The total in attendance was about 2,000.
Good old Northern Racing.
Colin
2,000? On a bank holiday? I’m shocked, Colin – but quite pleased, actually.
Maybe Northern Racing might put on some decent sport for a change and stop underestimating the faculties of their customers.
Do you know the cost of admission, btw? They charge an arm and a leg at Uttoxeter, I’m told. Is it the same at Chepstow?
Standard meeting £20 Premier £16 Grandstand & Paddock
Feature meeting £24 & £19
Welsh National £36 & £26
Colin
You’re easily pleased Max
The offical attendance at Chepstow on Bank Holiday Monday was 2226 which is 1300 down on the same fixture in 2009 and slightly under the average attendence* for last year (2265)
It was also someway below the attendance at the other courses on the same day; Fakenham 4488, Huntingdon 3455, Plumpton 4817, Yarmouth 3162, Redcar N/a.
Racecourse Attendance Enquiry HERE
* Excluding Welsh National Day
The control the big bookmakers have over the sport needs to be reviewed if the sport is to grow and attract new people.
The shortening of most the field in the Grand National was a disgrace, and was a planned tactic as most the pre-completed slips in the shops i visited were based on a punter taking S.P.
£16 to watch that standard of horse racing? Not even the best dressed alcoholic picnicker in Aberytstwyth would pay that. I would imagine.
And the man in charge of R4C was once the head honcho of the organisation that runs Chepstow. *sigh*
Thanks Colin, Pete.
Golf may have once been the bastion of the middle class in England but that is certainly not the case now.
The rise of Arnold Palmer in the late 50’s and early 60’s in the USA started the flood of interest in golf among the young and the general public who started flocking to driving ranges and public courses. That trend has been continued with El Tigre.
But it probably was not until the mid 1980’s that people began seeing golf as accessible in the UK to the every day man. Certainly the players coming to the fore from the home countries and Europe has a lot to do with it. Come the 1990’s and affordable golf courses were quickly becoming the norm in England and advances in equipment made it cheaper to produce and to take up the game. The R and A quickly seized this and made golf more accessible to people, especially juniors, than they had before.
The lesson for racing is not to cut the ties with its traditional past, embrace the good parts but reject the snotty elitism in favor of inclusion and that doesnt mean a drop in standards or a dumbing down as golf has proven.
Craig
- Total Posts 17716
Golf may have once been the bastion of the middle class in England but that is certainly not the case now.
My point was that it was the bastion of the
moneyed
class, which is much the same thing. Everyone who joins an English golf club has to have lots of that. And you won’t find state schools in England giving much free tuition.
Scotland was, and is, a different matter.
Class in the old fashioned sense – as usual in modern England, and certainly in Racing – is an odorous red herring.
£16 to watch that standard of horse racing? Not even the best dressed alcoholic picnicker in Aberytstwyth would pay that. I would imagine.
Again, at least as many folk, if not more, can and will stump that up for certain pointing meets (4,000 stumped up between £20 and £40 at Hackwood Park last week), which invites another question;
Putting the quality (or otherwise) of the racing to one side, is there something so inherently ghastly horrible about Chepstow as a raceday experience that people keep away in the numbers they do?
Interestingly, the card at Chepstow last Saturday had some competition it wouldn’t have bargained for originally. The rescheduled Glamorgan point-to-point took place at Ystradowen, near Cowbridge (Evan Williams territory, basically), on the same afternoon, having been postponed due to waterlogging a fortnight earlier.
Only 16 miles away from Chepstow, this basket case of a course (an eggtimer-shaped circuit begging to be converted into a figure of eight, perched on a plateau flanked on one side by pylons) would have been chilly even on that spring day, featured scant facilities (save for a screen showing the National) such as best-of-luck-to-you portaloos, and in common with most rescheduled fixtures suffered the fate of seeing most of its better entries defect to other races elsewhere.
Yet for all that it was one of the very friendliest, boisterous, and packed points I’d ever been to when I race-read at the corresponding fixture in 2007; and whilst a report I received from the doyen of Welsh racing, Brian Lee, yesterday didn’t quote the attendance figures at either, by all account the size of Ystradowen’s crowd last Saturday, "was one that Chepstow Races – held on the same day – would have died for!"
The pricing on the day would have been £10 per car & driver, £5 per additional passenger and £5 per pedestrian, but I’m dubious as to whether price alone played its part. Ystradowen is unfurnished and mad as a box of frogs but is generally a delight to attend. Chepstow is more orderly but generally isn’t.
gc
Jeremy Grayson. Son of immigrant. Adoptive father of two. Metadata librarian. Freelance point-to-point / horse racing writer, analyst and commentator wonk. Loves music, buses, cats, the BBC Micro, ale. Advocate of CBT, PACE and therapeutic parenting. Aspergers.
Golf may have once been the bastion of the middle class in England but that is certainly not the case now.
My point was that it was the bastion of the
moneyed
class, which is much the same thing. Everyone who joins an English golf club has to have lots of that. And you won’t find state schools in England giving much free tuition.
Actually no you dont these days. There was a time when you had to pay joining fees then a membership fee…..no longer!!
unless of course you want to play Wentworth or the like every week
Golf is more classless now than ive ever known it and ive played it for 25 years plus!!!.
Cannot be compared to Racing in any shape or form IMHO
You wanna talk class etc Royal Ascot and from what ive experienced York are awful for it!!!
Golf may have once been the bastion of the middle class in England but that is certainly not the case now.
(My point was that it was the bastion of the
moneyed
class, which is much the same thing. Everyone who joins an English golf club has to have lots of that. And you won’t find state schools in England giving much free tuition.)
Actually no you dont these days. There was a time when you had to pay joining fees then a membership fee…..no longer!!
unless of course you want to play Wentworth or the like every week
Golf is more classless now than ive ever known it and ive played it for 25 years plus!!!.
Cannot be compared to Racing in any shape or form IMHO
You wanna talk class etc Royal Ascot and from what ive experienced York are awful for it!!!
at least as many folk, if not more, can and will stump that up for certain pointing meets (4,000 stumped up between £20 and £40 at Hackwood Park last week), which invites another question;
The pricing on the day would have been £10 per car & driver, £5 per additional passenger and £5 per pedestrian, but I’m dubious as to whether price alone played its part. Ystradowen is unfurnished and mad as a box of frogs but is generally a delight to attend. Chepstow is more orderly but generally isn’t.
Folk may be happy to part with these sums despite the supposed ‘poor quality’ of the horses and races because points are – relatively speaking compared to Rules – few and far between and therefore regarded as ‘special events’ that are pencilled into diaries well in advance and anticipted with relish.
I’ve been to a few points down the years particularly the York & Ainsty at Easingwold and due to the novelty of the experience parking, entrance, nosh fees etc were of little concern. An enjoyable, relaxed family day out, ‘unique’ in the sense that a repeat performance wasn’t tomorrow, next week or next month
Unlike some Rules courses who seem to think charging upwards of £15 is reasonable to watch a three-hour yocto-slice pared off the indistinguishable 365/52/7 yotta-continuum of hum-drum racing
Familiarity breeds contempt
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