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It was good to see some quality jumps action at Lingfield again.
On today’s “Luck on Sunday”, the host speculated that Windsor is considering bringing back the jumps. I hope that happens. I always enjoyed the jumps there.
Agreed….
Sir Cherryade of Hampshire
("Chezza" to the proletariat)
Twitter: https://mobile.twitter.com/Ian_Davies_
https://www.facebook.com/ThePointtoPointNHandFlatracingpunter/The word godsend is totally appropriate.
With one eye I watched the Shishkin dual at Ascot yesterday in a tube station waiting room but very furtively. I was alone so put the volume up and used the other eye to make that no-one came in and surprised me. I felt guilty because waiting rooms are purely for waiting in, and nothing else, but this breach of rule unsurprisingly made the experience that more pleasurable. I took a big risk and engaged both of my eyes in the finish.
This gives me the clout to comment on Lingfield. I am still a fraud – but a little less so.Sadly, I see the words “trial” and “countdown” featuring in the race titles for Saturday, but at least we’ve got what used to be the Great Yorkshire Chase at Doncaster to look forward to.
Every race is a race in its own right – if enough of us believe that, order can be restored to the Jumps season.
Sir Cherryade of Hampshire
("Chezza" to the proletariat)
Twitter: https://mobile.twitter.com/Ian_Davies_
https://www.facebook.com/ThePointtoPointNHandFlatracingpunter/I have to confess, I wasn’t in favour of the idea of the “Winter Million” when it was first mooted so have I been won round? Partly.
First point, I was told General Admission was £40 which seems a little on the nose for the actual quality of the races – it would have been braver to charge a tenner and get more through the turnstiles.
Second, Lingfield were both lucky and unlucky with the weather – it’s been such a benign winter the meeting wasn’t in any serious threat but I thought on the Sunday the ground had dried up quite a bit. If you are going to market the Winter Million as “Cheltenham for Mudlarks” (and there’s clearly a niche for that) then you need to see some proper wet heavy ground.
Perhaps we could see Lingfield as England’s Auteuil – guarantee Heavy ground, put up some decent money and try to get some French jumpers come over to take on our Heavy ground performers. I think the Million has more of a future doing that than trying to be yet another Cheltenham “Trial” meeting.
The fixture list contains redundancy because meetings were often lost due to waterlogging, snow, frost etc but in a mild and benign winter with scarcely a meeting abandoned you end up with too many races for the horse population especially at the top end. A more proactive BHA would take this on by either a) culling meetings which weren’t needed or b) changing racing conditions on a one-off basis to ensure the “quality” races remain competitive and have more handicaps if that’s where the demand is.
Longer term and recognising milder winters and the use of frost sheets have likely permanently reduced the number of abandonments the fixture list needs to be re-designed to ensure the programme better reflects the reality of the horse population. Yesterday’s ludicrous small fields at Cheltenham and Doncaster testify to the need for urgent reform.
It would be difficult to get French runners to come over in January, as they have a winter break in the NH program at all the Paris tracks, where racing stops between Xmas and mid February.
There is still NH racing down in the south (Cagnes) and south west (Pau), but the quality is lower and it’s a long way to travel to Lingfield.
https://www.racingtv.com/news/robbie-power-i-don-t-fancy-frodon-kemboy-is-the-one-to-beat
Interesting, and understandable, thoughts from Robbie Power.
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