As with all racecourses, Cheltenham are tinkering like crazy with race names, race times, rules for qualifying for certain races, etc, to stoke up interest in their “product”.
We know that the names of the races are prone to change, as new sponsors replace those no longer on board. We know that a race or two might well be lowered/upped in Grade but for me personally, I love my horse racing. It doesn’t matter what they call the race, what the trip is, what the race time is, whether or not they want a horse to have raced “x number of times” in order to qualify, it’s just about the racing.
How they think having a race on Tuesday that was previously run on Thursday, will encourage support for racing, or attending the meeting, is beyond me.
They have knocked 30p off the price of a pint of Guinness….but it still costs £7.50….and still has me thinking I’ll have a beer once I have left the track.
Last year, on the Thursday, The Ryanair was run before the Stayers Hurdle. This year they flip flop….why?
The Close Brothers Mares’ Hurdle is run on the new course this season, adding 56 yards to the trip. Why?
They have limited the field size of the County hurdle on Friday, now only 24 can take part, instead of 26. Does removing two runners really improve “safety”? Doubt it’ll matter anyway as this year only 16 turned up. They have applied the same maximum field size to the Coral Cup.
I honestly believe that falling attendances at the Festival has nothing at all to do with any of the above. It is down to the fact a hotel room is bumped up by 1000%, the price of a ticket to get in, a tray of fish and chips, and £7.50 for a pint of Guinness.
Sort those things out, rather than running the Ryanair before the Stayers Hurdle, and thinking that will have people saying, “great, I’ll go next year”.
