General Chat

[Birds Nest]

Bandwidth limit exceeded 509....crashed for a couple of hours

[The hill]

Swan got a ride today at Thurles 14:53 from memory I think he needs 2 more Chase wins to ride in the 4 miler?

[HesTheOne]

Well I finally made it on to Road To Cheltenham, offering out signed Impaire Et Passe Turners betslips on the back of it

[Block 205]

All about personal Opinions / experiences though i think . Been to the D.R.F the last two years .
Yes , it was busy , But my mate and myself able to walk up to the bar and get a drink , able to sit down and eat a Decent meal under 16 euros .
Get a seat in the Grandstand at no extra cost . for 50 euro's for two days .
We booked early door's for flights , and hotel . So the whole lot came in at less than the price of 4 days at cheltenham..
definitely recommend it if you haven't been . .

I'm just catching up on this whole Cheltenham v DRF debate, and it's been great to hear everyones' views on it. I've been going to all 3 or 4 days of the Festival for over 25 years and a group of us have also been over for every DRF weekend since it started, and I find those six days of the year extremely enjoyable, although they have their differences. Cheltenham has always been extremely busy during the Festival, but the addition of the new stands and facilities at the back of those stands a number of years ago made everything less crowded than it had been previously, and encouraged a group of us to start getting membership including the Festival, and to watch from the new stands rather than Best Mate where we had previously gone.

No-one would be able to claim that Cheltenham's cheap, and the DRF is a fraction of the cost for ticket prices, and pints of Guinness are £7.50 at Cheltenham v €6.80 (i.e. £5.80) at Leopardstown, and the addition of the app on which you could pre-order drinks this year at Leopardstown was a major bonus. It's noticeably busier on the Saturday of the DRF than the Sunday, but it's still generally been OK to get a drink between races (with the exception a few years ago when Ireland were playing in the Six Nations at the Aviva on the Saturday and all of the hosptality staff were there rather than at the track, which was a bit of a nightmare), and you can always get up into the stands and get a decent view of the races. The quality of racing at the DRF is fantastic, with numerous Grade 1s over the two days, and although some of the field sizes this year were a bit disappointing (as they were the year that they let the ground get too firm), you still get to see a very high percentage of the very best Irish horses have their last runs before Cheltenham, in races that are significant in their own right.

Having said all that (and this might just be the way that I personally view it), I'm always watching the DRF races with a view to how that might affect things in six weeks time at the Festival, whether it's checking out the state of antepost bets, confirming a shortie at the head a of a market, a few bubbles bursting, or just a few more clues as to how Mullins might shuffle his pack around, and the main event is still yet to come. I don't think that anything can beat the atmosphere and excitement that's generated at the Festival, and to hear the noise when the commentator calls a short priced favourite as still being on the bridle coming to the home turn is just something else - for my part, I'm going to carry on enjoying both for as long as health and circumstances permit, and accept them both as what they are.

[MTR]

Will there be individual threads up this year? Supreme, ballymore etc

[Eggs]

Will there be individual threads up this year? Supreme, ballymore etc

….personally think it’s working quite well at this point, especially with so much uncertainty regarding who goes where. Maybe a consideration after the next decs if it all becomes clearer.

[Istabraq]

….personally think it’s working quite well at this point, especially with so much uncertainty regarding who goes where. Maybe a consideration after the next decs if it all becomes clearer.

I agree.
We've been guilty in the past of going too early with race threads and they descend into chaos because of the uncertainty you mention.
It seems to have worked well this Winter...

[Odin]

Also agree, I'd even argue given the amount of traffic they've had that the handicap threads were up too soon this year even though I completely understand entries as a logical starting point for them so maybe it's just because there's limited value there ATM.

Maybe 5 day decs would be a good time for the individual novice race threads? 2 days feels too short a timeframe to me?

[Benjy23]

It's basically Mullins bingo as the only argument against individual threads at this point. Which I guess is why there's handicap ones, where he's less involved.

The problem with that is there's unlikely going to be a better time between now and decs on that front...

[Carnage at Taunton]

I could see the Supreme and BB threads filling up with the same stuff!!
Agree with leaving it to when we know more definite race plans.

[Irish Rugby]

Just over 2 weeks to go and when are we going to start talking about the ground for day 1?

It seems to have been another wet winter and with Fontwell abandoned today, waterlogged, Plumpton having to get through an inspection in the morning for Monday, and the other meeting, Ayr, still described as heavy going, are we going to get continued wet weather over the next 2 weeks, leading to a soft first day, or will we have the good old safe good to soft (with hopefully not another Wednesday downpour).

Any one close enough to the course able to offer daily weather updates? Going and weather updates prominent on both of the two sites, below.

https://cheltenham.attheraces.com/

https://www.thejockeyclub.co.uk/cheltenham/owners-and-trainers/the-going/

[Eggs]

Just over 2 weeks to go and when are we going to start talking about the ground for day 1?

It seems to have been another wet winter and with Fontwell abandoned today, waterlogged, Plumpton having to get through an inspection in the morning for Monday, and the other meeting, Ayr, still described as heavy going, are we going to get continued wet weather over the next 2 weeks, leading to a soft first day, or will we have the good old safe good to soft (with hopefully not another Wednesday downpour).

Any one close enough to the course able to offer daily weather updates? Going and weather updates prominent on both of the two sites, below.

https://cheltenham.attheraces.com/

https://www.thejockeyclub.co.uk/cheltenham/owners-and-trainers/the-going/

….Sky offer odds on official day 1 going;

Gd/Soft 4/7
Soft 13/8
Heavy 14-1
Good 16-1
Gd/Fm 150-1

[Dandrew99]

It's been dry all day today, but overcast. No notable rain expected. Definitely dryer than it was a few weeks ago.

[Rooster Booster]

The Green Goddess gave us brilliant insight last year. I haven’t seen her post for a while but if you are reading would love it if you could help us out again this year.

[Lobos]

From 14:day forecast it looks like a dry week leading up to the Fez which is perfect. I reckon G/S first day and the usual wash out on the Wednesday. Soft Thursday and drying to G/S again for GC day. Sorted.