Tuesday Thoughts

There are two jumps meetings today at Bangor and Newcastle but the stable does not have runners.  Jack Tudor is in action at Bangor and looks to have some good chances of winners for Christian Williams.  A horse I shall be watching with interest is Rule Me In in the 3.50pm handicap chase over 2m4f.  It was well backed and didn't feature behind my own horse (family horse!) Jaipaletemps at Chepstow last time.  It seems to be being backed again and at the time of writing is 4/1 second best in the betting.  There is one all-weather flat meeting at Wolverhampton and in Ireland they have a jumps card at Limerick.

Yesterday, news broke that Cheltenham would not be holding their final meetings of the season as work will be getting underway to repair the drainage up the home straight.  You may of course remember back in January their was controversy when a hole was found during racing and although they go through the Festival it appears the problem is much bigger than anticipated.  The experts have been called in and there is going to be a lot of work done in the next few months and they want to start now so that it will be all sorted and back ready for action in October.  On social media I see there is quite a lot of unhappy people that particularly the two day April fixture has been abandoned.  The announcement seemed to come out of the blue and there was no consultation with trainers etc to discuss possible re-arrangements.  I have also seen posts from people who have bought tickets and booked hotels to stay for the meeting.  They have re-arranged some of the races from the two-day fixture to other racecourses but why could they not move the whole card somewhere?  That is what a lot of trainers are unhappy about.  They have moved the entire hunter chase meeting which is at the beginning of May and that will now be run at Warwick.  A little closer to home, Jack Pipe was very much looking forward to his pony racing day there this coming Friday which has also been affected.  Fair play to the organisers however, they have moved this day and it will now take place at Maisemore point to point course.  Not quite Cheltenham but it will be good for Jack to get some more race experience and good work by all the organisers to get this sorted so quickly.

The football World Cup play-offs return this evening with teams searching for a place in the tournament proper later this summer.  Sadly, all the home teams exited last week but Italy and the Czech Republic are two of the more prominent teams who will be looking to progress.  There are also plenty of International friendly matches as well and England are at home to Japan at 7.45pm.  Wales play Northern Ireland and Scotland play the Ivory Coast.

I taught my kids about democracy last night by having them vote on which film to watch and pizza to order.

I then picked the film and pizza because I am the one with the money!

Have a good day!