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Make A Stand would be an unlikely winner of the Champion Hurdle these days.
In my view it would be perfectly acceptable and fair to aim for good on day 1 on each course. Last year was much softer than needed. Graysonscolumn, they may not water on the evening of day 1 but I think they continue watering the other course up till Weds eve?
Aye, that would make sense come to think of it, Grey. I presume the Old on Tuesday night and the New on Thursday night don’t receive a sprinkling, though.
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.
Why cannot they just leave the ground alone, seign horses being flogged u that hill on heavy ground is not a very pretty site…
Greg Wood in the Guardian has clearly been reading this thread!
The news that the track at Cheltenham could be watered from this Sunday ahead of its Festival meeting next month emerged early last Sunday evening, and the first howls of protest were hitting internet forums within minutes. "I’m gutted," one poster wrote on The Racing Forum. "I have totally wasted my money having a bet on Blue Bajan [for the Champion Hurdle]."
Sympathy was not long delayed. "I think this approach is a shame," was one response. "Why can’t fast-ground horses have their day in the sun when conditions suit them?" Another poster was even more indignant. "I despise this current watering trend," he wrote. "Please leave it alone, it is ruining the sport and is a total prejudice against sound-surface horses."
Watering, clearly, remains an emotive subject for many punters, and there are plenty of trainers and owners too who will go straight into attack mode if they feel a clerk of the course has been too quick – or, for that matter, too slow – to turn on the taps.
As with so many issues, though, it tends to be the not-contents who make the most noise about watering, and since this is racing, often do so with some backward glances. They didn’t bother too much about lightning-fast ground in the 1960s, after all, and if it was good enough for Arkle, why isn’t it good enough for us too?
The answer, quite simply, is that attitudes, both inside and outside racing, have changed profoundly over the last 40 years. It is no longer enough to pay lip-service to the idea of animal welfare. Everything that can be done to reduce the risk of injuries needs to be done, and also, crucially, to be seen to be done.
It is inevitable that watering will play a part in this, because in jumping at least, there are clear links between the going and the injury rate.
"In jumps racing, there is an unambiguous connection, and it is one of the few factors where the link is obvious and beyond dispute," Tim Morris, the British Horseracing Authority’s director of equine science and welfare, said yesterday.
"We have statistics from thousands of races and hundreds of thousands of starts, and the graph goes down steadily and directly from firm to soft, and only stops going down at heavy ground, when horses can get very tired and are more likely to make mistakes."
It is not a question, as some have said, of good ground no longer being considered safe. It is, but good-to-soft is safer, and with four days of racing at the Festival it makes sense to aim for good-to-soft, however it might be achieved, on the opening day.
Of course, it remains a relatively inexact science, nor is the situation on the Flat quite so clear-cut. But that does not mean that the principle is wrong.
Rather, it should be a question of making sure sufficient information is given to punters. Simply putting "watered" in brackets after a going description is not enough, and nor, for that matter, is a GoingStick reading taken 48 hours before racing.
But Cheltenham will not be guilty on either count, and have given seven days’ notice that they are planning to water too. The policy of aiming for good-to-soft on the first day probably needs some further publicity, though, if people are still backing horses for the Champion Hurdle in the hope that it will ride like a road.
Horses will still die at the Festival. Nothing will ever change that.
But racing needs to be sure that it has done everything possible to reduce the risks. In the long term, that is not "ruining the sport" but working to keep it safe.
Greg Wood in the Guardian has clearly been reading this thread!
The news that the track at Cheltenham could be watered from this Sunday ahead of its Festival meeting next month emerged early last Sunday evening, and the first howls of protest were hitting internet forums within minutes. "I’m gutted," one poster wrote on The Racing Forum. "I have totally wasted my money having a bet on Blue Bajan [for the Champion Hurdle]."
Sympathy was not long delayed. "I think this approach is a shame," was one response. "Why can’t fast-ground horses have their day in the sun when conditions suit them?" Another poster was even more indignant. "I despise this current watering trend," he wrote. "Please leave it alone, it is ruining the sport and is a total prejudice against sound-surface horses."
Watering, clearly, remains an emotive subject for many punters, and there are plenty of trainers and owners too who will go straight into attack mode if they feel a clerk of the course has been too quick – or, for that matter, too slow – to turn on the taps.
As with so many issues, though, it tends to be the not-contents who make the most noise about watering, and since this is racing, often do so with some backward glances. They didn’t bother too much about lightning-fast ground in the 1960s, after all, and if it was good enough for Arkle, why isn’t it good enough for us too?
The answer, quite simply, is that attitudes, both inside and outside racing, have changed profoundly over the last 40 years. It is no longer enough to pay lip-service to the idea of animal welfare. Everything that can be done to reduce the risk of injuries needs to be done, and also, crucially, to be seen to be done.
It is inevitable that watering will play a part in this, because in jumping at least, there are clear links between the going and the injury rate.
"In jumps racing, there is an unambiguous connection, and it is one of the few factors where the link is obvious and beyond dispute," Tim Morris, the British Horseracing Authority’s director of equine science and welfare, said yesterday.
"We have statistics from thousands of races and hundreds of thousands of starts, and the graph goes down steadily and directly from firm to soft, and only stops going down at heavy ground, when horses can get very tired and are more likely to make mistakes."
It is not a question, as some have said, of good ground no longer being considered safe. It is, but good-to-soft is safer, and with four days of racing at the Festival it makes sense to aim for good-to-soft, however it might be achieved, on the opening day.
Of course, it remains a relatively inexact science, nor is the situation on the Flat quite so clear-cut. But that does not mean that the principle is wrong.
Rather, it should be a question of making sure sufficient information is given to punters. Simply putting "watered" in brackets after a going description is not enough, and nor, for that matter, is a GoingStick reading taken 48 hours before racing.
But Cheltenham will not be guilty on either count, and have given seven days’ notice that they are planning to water too. The policy of aiming for good-to-soft on the first day probably needs some further publicity, though, if people are still backing horses for the Champion Hurdle in the hope that it will ride like a road.
Horses will still die at the Festival. Nothing will ever change that.
But racing needs to be sure that it has done everything possible to reduce the risks. In the long term, that is not "ruining the sport" but working to keep it safe.
Hey I’m famous lol
Seriously though I wish courses would read and sink it in.
The flat will be here soon with never-ending watering in the pursuit of "perfect" ground which is even more infuriating seeing as the flat is a summer sport and supposedly about speed.
Courses shouldn’t be "aiming" for any ground other than safe ground and to be honest their reasons / excuses I find almost as annoying as the watering itself.Please read course clerks and associates : STOP WATERING UNLESS IT’S TO TAKE A DANGEROUS JAR OUT OF THE GROUND!!
Think they’ll ever get the message? No they’ll be pig-headed rather like politicians are, punters don’t matter.
Why cannot they just leave the ground alone, seign horses being flogged u that hill on heavy ground is not a very pretty site…
That was pretty much
Timeform Chasers and Hurdlers
‘ argument against striving for soft-as-possible Cheltenham going in the 2005-6 edition.
My counter at the time was, and remains, whether it is really that credible to suggest that races such as Desert Orchid’s Gold Cup win in 1989 on testing ground paint the sport in an irretrievably unpalatable light – I’d tentatively suggest not.
Not halfway as much, at any rate, as the high loss rate accrued on rather faster going during the 2006 Festival.
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.
- Total Posts 17716
If good, or good to firm ground is considered not as safe, then surely
all
jump races should be run on soft or heavy ground?
The argument for slow ground at the Festival is a nonsense unless it is also applied to the Hennessy, the Ladbroke, the Betfred, the Swinton, the Grand National, and every other well-contested race throughout the season.
Horse welfare is horse welfare and, much like a horse’s chances in a race, or indeed form in the form book, should not be turned on or off at the caprice of individual COC’s.
Courses shouldn’t be "aiming" for any ground other than safe ground and to be honest their reasons / excuses I find almost as annoying as the watering itself.
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