Sunday's Meetings Stratford N/H 6 Races 2:15-5:10p.m. Perth N/H 6 Races 2:30-5:25p.m. Racecards At The Races Sporting Life Racing Post Good Luck
Yes, Chan, pretty awful. Think I've fished one out at Perth, but still pondering! Fancy nothing at Stratford, larger felds but very poor quality.
something seriously wrong with racing as an industry , sunday , biggest leisure day of the week , two meetings , one with barely 4 runners per race , the other very low grade , yet during the weekdays there are six or seven meetings day / evening. Does this reflect the historical class bias among racing’s ruling bodies , they don’t work in the week like normal folk , they class racing as going to work , not including racing workforce in this btw , they graft all the time , sunday should be a big racing day .
It just doesn't make sense. Surely just move one of yesterdays meetings from York, Ascot or Newmarket to today. Ok, they might not like it not being on a Saturday but can't the bha say tough, we need a Sunday card.
Hopefully HM Queen and Sir Chips Keswick will have enough gusto left in them after their undoubtedly busy week to make it down to Stratford to see their runner in the 3.25
Without wishing to start any sort of class war debate on the daily thread, I think you might find that over the last twenty or so years, the fixture list has been doctored considerably to try and move more of the big races and big meetings towards weekends to try and attract new racegoers. Historically, most of the big meetings were midweek (Royal Ascot, July Meeting, Ebor Meeting, etc.) and just a few of the big races were on Saturdays when they were stand alone feature races like the race formerly known as the King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Diamond Stakes. I can remember when the 1000 Guineas was midweek and the 2000 Guineas on Saturday; and, of course, The Derby was Wednesday. During the summer months when there is no football then this measure might work as there are fewer alternatives for sportsgoers’ disposable income. I used to go to midweek meetings quite a lot and the crowd was always notably older – people with time and money. Given the demographic situation, racing is targeting the wrong people as young people have less and less disposable income. I expect that today is short of decent meetings because HQ and York both raced on Saturday; and as has been pointed out elsewhere, the weather has scuppered the summer jumping cards as most of the horses that trainers run at this time of the year do not want soft ground.
