Horse Racing: Farnsworth calls for new Musselburgh race dates

Published on Thursday 31 December 2009 10:00

THE abandonment of tomorrow's New Year's Day fixture at Musselburgh means the East Lothian track has now lost three successive race meetings for the first time since jump racing started there 22 years ago,

And with more than a dozen meetings having fallen to the arctic weather in Scotland and the north in less than a fortnight, racecourse boss Bill Farnsworth is set to ask the British Horseracing Authority for extra fixtures in the next couple of months.

"Losing our last three meetings has been a real blow, especially as two of those were in the middle of the holiday period," he said. "And with Ayr likely to be frozen off on Saturday, it means Scottish racing has lost its last five meetings.

"Add the lost meetings in the north of England and this area has certainly been hard hit and so I'll be asking the BHA for some extra fixtures in January and February. It's not just for Musselburgh, but will also help owners, trainers, jockeys and anyone else involved in the industry up here."

The BHA rules on abandoned meetings stipulate that the total lost must reach 50 before extra meetings can be scheduled, but Farnsworth feels that total should be split both regionally and on a time scale basis.

"They are still racing in the south, so it may be some time before we get to that 50 mark, so I'm asking the BHA to consider a figure of half that total for the north and Scotland.

Musselburgh has only eight fixtures in its jumping calendar and two meetings are scheduled for January and two the following month, so there is ample scope to slot in extra dates.

"It's a depressing end to the year as we also lost two jump meetings in the spring, but we had some notable highlights during the flat season, including a record crowd on Ladies' Day and we have some exciting plans for 2010, including a new race – the Edinburgh Cup in June which I am hoping will be the first ever 100,000 race to be run here," he added.

- JOE ROWNTREE, the Edinburgh Evening News racing expert, is champion tipster in Scotland – and that's official.

He has won the 2009 Scottish Media Tipster Challenge, showing a profit of 26.25 on his selections at Scottish fixtures. The competition is sponsored by totesport and Joe led the field for much of the year, thanks to good priced winners like My Arch (9-1) and Wee Charlie Castle (10-1) at his local track Musselburgh.

"It's the third year of the competition and Joe deserves to scoop the 1,000 prize for his highly consistent winner-finding efforts," said Scottish Racing's Jonathan Garrett "and we'll look forward to presenting him with a cheque at Musselburgh in the new year."

Top tipsters, 2009: 1 Joe Rowntree (Edinburgh Evening News) +26.25, 2 Ed Watson Turf Talk (Scottish Mail on Sunday) +21.03, 3 Richard Young (Freelance) +7.50, 4 William Harvey (BBC Ceefax Page) +2.48, 5 Alex Steedman (Racing UK) -0.21, 6 Scotsirish (The Irish Field) -1.34, 7 The Minstrel (Carrick Gazette) -2.75, 8 Fanning's Fancy (Hamilton Advertiser) -5.94, 9 Martin Hannan (Scotland on Sunday) -6.00, 10 Brian Yule (Motherwell Times) -6.81, 11 John Scanlon (Kingsley Klarion) -8.74, 12 Fraser Perratt (Dundee Courier) -10.75, 13 Jim Delahunt (Sunday Herald) -11.37; 14 Silver Spur (Sunday Sun) -16.29, 14 John Budden (The Cumberland News) -17.17, 15 Ebor (York Evening Press) -17.31, 16 Macsnag (Milngavie & Bearsden Herald) -18.05, 17 Ray Gilpin (Press Association) -19.18, 18 North (Racing Post) -30.38, 19 Garry Owen ( Daily Record) -33.69, 20 John Grossick -45.25.