BHA INTRODUCE NEW COVID FINES

thE BhA have beefed up penalties for offences like breaching social distancing rules, not wearing a mask and straying into the wrong zones on racecourses — a move that underlines that the end of Covid-19 protocols for racing are nowhere near in sight. After the agreement of the racing industry Covid Group, racecourse officials will be able to issue fines for repeated protocol breaches.

Fines will start at £140 for a first offence, rising to referral to the BhA for a fourth offence. Under current rules, protocol breaches are dealt with via caution on the day or, for more serious infringements, immediate exclusion from the racecourse for a minimum of ten days, pending further investigation. racing and its Covid-19 protocols will be under keen scrutiny at the forthcoming big spring festivals at Cheltenham and Aintree. Meanwhile, the allweather Flat meetings at Lingfield and Wolverhampton are the only survivors of the icy blasts in Britain today — and the former will have to survive an 8am inspection. the fixture casualties even included last night’s and this afternoon’s scheduled fixture on the all-weather at Chelmsford because of snow on the track. today’s scheduled meeting at Warwick, which includes Dan skelton’s Allmankind in the Kingmaker Novices’ Chase, will now be run on Monday. today’s scheduled Newbury meeting, which would have featured Champ in the Denman Chase and Altior in the Game spirit Chase, will be run a week tomorrow on sunday, February 21.