Above: Christmas Night leads out through the snow on the way to the AW gallop
DATE POSTED: 28th February 2018
It may well be minus three, with a wind-chill of minus 10 out there, but racehorse trainers are still busy making sure our horses are going to be ready for the start of the flat season! We've been speaking with our trainers today and they all report bad conditions but are 'getting on with it!'.
Above we have Christmas Night leading the second lot of the day at Ollie Pears' yard in Malton at 8-30am this morning. Ollie reports close to a foot of snow on the ground in places, but the All-Weather surface on the Wold gallop is still operating, so they are up there to canter. Ollie told us "We aren't doing anything too quick today - the snow and the wind are just too bad, but its good enough to get them out. I actually think they enjoy it - mind you the riders are getting pretty cold!"
The view from Tommy's farmhouse today
Further down the country in Worcestershire we have Tommy Gretton, who supplied these two photos at 8-00am this morning. He has his own cantering circle which they are using today, but as you can see, the schooling hurdles and chase fences are under plenty of snow. Tommy told us "It's making everything take twice as long, but all my staff managed to make it in and we're feeding and walking them. If the wind calms down we will canter a few late morning at home, but the gallops are under a few inches of snow, so we won't go up there today."
However, Tommy has plans to go and have an 'away day' with some of his horses later this week, so they will get their gallops at Wolverhampton racecourse or possibly at Lambourn or another private gallops.
There will be no schooling today...
It's tough going at the moment, especially for the jumping yards, but as you can see, the task of training racehorses continues despite the inclement weather!