- Sunday, 17 August 2014 00:00
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
There are just two meetings taking place this afternoon but at least race planning have managed to ensure that there is one on the level and one over jumps. The flat card comes from Pontefract, while the National Hunt action takes place at Southwell. The stable has two runners at Southwell this afternoon; Azza and Houston Dynimo. Azza bids to follow-up her chase debut success in the novices' chase - she looks to have a good chance with only 10-0 on her back and is a nice ride for Conor O'Farrell. With £6,000 up for grabs, it is certainly a prize worth winning. Meanwhile, our other runner Houston Dynimo makes his debut for the stable this afternoon and is the mount of perennial champion jockey A P McCoy. Yesterday's Market Rasen runners have stayed up north overnight to avoid the worst of the traffic - the M5 near the yard has more closely resembled a car park of late. I left home at 5.30am to get to the yard this morning and even at that time the roads were much busier than usual.
Well done to Southwell racecard for securing excellent funding for today's meeting - there is a handicap chase worth £22,000 while the poorest race on the card is worth a respectable £4,000. These smaller tracks are giving a good example to their larger counterparts that it is possible to raise the money. Over at Pontefract there is a Listed race worth £50,000.
Can anyone tell me why there were eight meetings on yesterday afternoon, while there are only two today? The kids are off school and the parents should be off work, surely this is the time the tracks should be offering free admission and getting these future race goers onto the track?
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Mrs Barnes hates it when the football season is about to kick off. My son Lester is also a football fanatic so you can guess where we will be...glued to the television for Liverpool versus Southampton followed by Newcastle versus Manchester City. It looks like a home win for Liverpool and an away win for City. It looks to me as though the Premiership can only be won by four teams: Manchester City, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal - that should suitably upset Stuart Mercer, Tony Lomas and Eddie Buckley!
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Martin has gone to the sales at Deauville this weekend. I went along last year and bumped into legend and my great hero Lester Piggott who was standing at the bar quietly enjoying a bottle of champagne. He looks just the same as he did when he was riding.
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