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So very disappointing to be spooned such low-grade quality today fror a bank holiday.<br>Seems not so long ago that there would be around ten meetings on a holiday Monday (true, a lot of dross maybe amongst the numerous meetings, but at least there was choice).<br>Today, an A/W makes up the quartet of only four cards — the highest grade of race on offer being a Class 3. Truly appalling stuff.
Meanwhile, over in Ireland (with a population 1/30th that of Britain) there are as many Turf meetings (3) as there are in the UK. And the Curragh can offer three Group 3 races, two Listed races, and even the lowly NH Flat race is a £20,000 affair.
Why is this? Is this symptomatic of the way racing is going? Is this what suits the High Street Books who are more enamoured with FOBT’s and BAGS than with decent racing. <br>"I’ve seen the future, dude, and it’s grim."
With around 4, 1/2 million in the republic and another 1, 1/2 million in the North with a poulation of around 60 million living in Britain my calculation would be around 1/10th. <br>I agree with you hoofhearted, but it is generallly the same every Bank Holiday in Britain, usually a plethora of meetings with very little in the way of Quality. Is the Temple stakes still run on a Bank Holiday ?? my memory has deserted me, but I seem to remember it been the only Group Race to be run on Bank Holiday monday during the entire flat season.
I agree that it’s poor. But bear in mind that we’ve just had Guineas weekend, with a lot of top-class horses out at Newmarket. So I’d imagine on the Monday following this the racing would be of a particularly dross standard. It’s just a shame that it happened to be a bank holiday.
The Monday following the Guineas (and the Derby) is always a Bank Holiday, is it not?
Not the Derby.
But a great idea to have Windsor and Kempton providing 2 of the 4 fixtures. Whoever sanctioned that is a worthy candidate for Pillock Of The Year.
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Isn’t the problem, as AP recently pointed out, that owing to an OFT ruling, fixtures are now a free-for-all, in that UK racing’s rulers can no longer dictate what  fixtures are when, and the courses themselves more or less choose their own?<br>It appears the Irish have a much saner policy?
(Edited by reet hard at 5:58 pm on May 7, 2007)
<br>The meeting at Windsor was a transfer from Doncaster due to the rebuilding work there – both are Arena Leisure managed tracks.
The other three fixtures have all been regulars on this day for many years. The only change is that the jumping meetings that used to be held on this day have been moved, mostly to Sundays as those are generally better for the tracks concerned. That’s because the Sunday meetings get SIS coverage and thus the full payment from the shops.
As has been pointed out earlier, if any of the tracks tried to stage top class racing today, where would the runners come from? Anyway, I’m pretty sure we saw one future Group race winner today, possibly two.
AP
<br>The two I had in mind were Lucarno (could be a Brittania Hcp candidate before Group races) and Graduation.
AP
AP, may I ask …………….. what kind of ballpark figure would we be talking about regarding "meetings get SIS coverage and thus the full payment from the shops." ? Would, say, Cartmel get the same amount as Newmarket?<br>I really would like to know.<br>Thanks in advance,<br>Jack C.
<br>To the best of my knowledge, the courses get in the region of £4000 for each race shown on SIS, except for races also shown on BBC or C4.
It’s the same amount for all courses, but there are provisions for reduced payment for races with less than eight runners and I’m not sure of the detail for those.
The deal with SIS covers three meetings every afternoon (four on Saturday and Bank Holidays) and evening meetings.
AP
AP is right in that the BAGS payment for an eight or more runner race is £4300, though I seem to remember that Northern Racing did a cheaper deal with the bookies as did Arena Leisure re bandit racing, the main reason they stopped bandit fixtures as they were not making enough profit.
It’s quite right to say that theoretically courses can race when thy want ‘cos of the OFT, but in practice it doesn’t work that way as fixtures still have to be sanctioned by the BHB and it’s up to the Levy Board to decide whether to fund them.
The basic point is that it is in the gift of the bookies whether they want to pay for picture rights for meetings beyond the minimum numbers AP itemised. If a track where they traditinally make less money than the average is staging a meet, they may decide not to show it in betting shops. As part of their defense against Turf TV they recently dropped Huntingdon just to make the point that they believe they run racing in the UK. Which , of course, to all intents and purposes, they do – at the moment at least.
However, the Tri-oply that run racing have at last got a challenge in Turf TV, which despite their blustering they are going to have to take as horseracing is still the main driver of getting punters into betting shops.
Be interesting to see how things develop.
richard
Not the most inspiring Bank Holiday Monday under Rules at least, granted, but I had smashing time at Ashorne point-to-point, watching Sam Waley-Cohen coax Irilut to the sixth win of a fabulous season.
Something for everyone this last weekend, if you could seek it out.
gc<br>
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.
would love to agree that windsor and kempton on same day a recipe for disaster,
fact, my son did more slips at kempton than I at newmarket on 2000gns day,
I did more slips at windsor than I did at newmarket on 1000gns day,
both days at newmarket were dry and sunny
bank holiday monday was cold with heavy showers.
imbeleivable but true
When I saw this thread title, I thought it might have had something to do with Judith Chalmers lying on a beach in Barbados. Looks like I got the wrong end of the stick.
very poor racing on b h monday the only highlight being pheonix tower.<br>things will improve next b h monday with the zetland gold cup at redcar and the temple and henry vii at sandown.
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