‘We were told to carry on and enjoy the racing’
IT’S the Cheltenham Festival this week but like no other. No racegoers, no corporate suits and no Gordon Elliott either.
There will be horses, of course, and 28 races, including the Champion Hurdle, Champion Chase and Gold Cup – the holy trifecta of jump racing for punters.
Just like the two tracks of turf primed for battle, the Old Course for Tuesday and Wednesday, New Course for Thursday and Friday, there will also be strict lines of demarcation.
Separate changing rooms for Irish jockeys, temporary cabin-style accommodation in the Best Mate Enclosure for travelling Irish stable staff.
Ruby Walsh, the sharpest of analysts, won’t be alongside ITV’s Ed Chamberlin and Co in the parade ring due to his presence in the Willie Mullins team. Instead, he’ll be beamed in for his comments.
While the Irish trainers and jockeys that head to the Cotswolds will be housed in two wings of the Ellenborough Park hotel, just north of the Spa town, which can be accessed from the racecourse by a private road.
This upscale resort is usually the retreat of JP McManus, who tended to land quicker than anyone on day one of the Festival, such as owning the past four winners of the Champion Hurdle. This week could be a fifth straight for JP, and a 10th overall, but he won’t be there.
Very few of the regulars will be either as the Jockey Club oversees a cocoon of public safety around the racecourse in a bid to keep the invisible enemy of Covid19 away from the gates.
In the town centre, hotels which usually charge £250 a night for a broom cupboard, are offering suites at a knockdown £70. The landmark Queens Hotel, the pulse of Festival camaraderie, is closed.
How different it was 12 months ago when Cheltenham caroused with life and the authorities laughed in the face of the health crisis encircling them.
As the pandemic advanced, they had a choice: either stage the meeting behind closed doors, or carry on regardless. They chose the latter, citing advice from Westminster. It was an error which had terrible consequences.
In these pages a year ago, I wrote that there is never the wrong time to do the right thing. Cheltenham should have called a halt to crowds, no later than Wednesday, the day the World Health Organisation declared the outbreak a pandemic. I stand over that.
By March 27, when UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson tested positive for Covid, it was too late for many who went to the
Festival, and also for those who returned home, asymptomatic and unaware of the contagion they were bringing to their communities.
There were 60,000 racegoers crammed into Cheltenham for the first three days of the meeting, while over 65,000 rolled in for Gold Cup day. And ‘crammed’ is the word.
For a glimpse of the horses in the parade ring before or after races, or for a decent position in the grandstands to see the action, you had to squeeze between bodies for a squint.
It was the same if you wanted to place a bet, buy a burger, or use the toilets. You queued, shoulder to shoulder.
It was sardine-factor ten that no amount of hand gel was going to ward off. Whatever was doing the rounds, from a seasonal sniffle to a silent virulent killer, was passed from Billy to Jack. And to Billy’s friend. And Jack’s too. And so on.
And for those hand dispensers dotted around the enclosures, they were akin to taking out a Sherman tank with a couple of pea-shooters. Utterly insufficient, and also overlooked.
Yet, we were told to carry on and enjoy the racing, the craic agus ceol. All that was missing was Captain Smith atop the grandstand with a bullhorn telling us not to worry about the wee shower of hail.
I recalled so little about the racing on day one that I had to look up the results this week. The day’s SPs were all about JP, who owned four winners, including Epatante in the Champion Hurdle.
As winner after winner returned in JP’s silks, it mirrored the lyrics of George Ezra’s Shotgun, ‘as time flies by in the yellow and green’ which it did that blurry Tuesday.
Unlike the next line, I didn’t ‘stick around and you’ll see what I mean’.
I knew I ‘gotta hit the road’ and was up and gone the next morning, thankfully with a clean bill of health.
‘GOING AHEAD WAS AN ERROR WHICH HAD TERRIBLE CONSEQUENCES’