Festival Weather Watch

A few days ago these same people were saying he’d call it good-to-soft whatever happened, Thank God I didn’t listen to them.

You are hilarious Uncle. You seem to get your kicks out of perceiving yourself as the sharpest tool in the box.

You certainly are a tool alright.

yr.no now giving heavy rain for sunday evening/night, approx 1/2 inch of rain.

It's changing all the time. Heavy ground  a strong possibility, but will he call it? Is it too late to alter any "samcro" decision?

Still upset about the Liverpool result Charwell.

I won’t rub it in by telling you how much I won on Man Utd.

Ah, yes of course you did. Yet another classic uncle aftertiming bet. You never lose do you?

Still pretending you're a Liverpool fan as well?!

A drenched Angela Rippon has set up a fund for next year to help treat anyone suffering trauma from Festival going ramping threads.

It is to be called the Sir Ranulph Fiennes Ramping Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Fund and is also supported by Ant Middleton who is about to start a thread on here titled 'Applications for Fat B*stards Wont Last an Hour' to bring those causing the trauma to task.

very pleasantly surprised. It’s soft for sure, but a long way from being desperate.

Nicky Henderson tells Graham Dench how he found the ground at Cheltenham this morning. Updated weather story to follow on racingpost.com

Cheers Geoff, that is good news,just hope rain keeps away

rain has just started again

Rocketing it DOWN now.
This lite stuff

Is supposed to last all nite

yep hammering down now

Heavy Tuesday?

Still hammering down ? Claisse appeared with the Napalm yet

Forecast all day tomorrow as well, got to be heavy on Tuesday

4 mm so far.

More forecast after racing too on thursday. It could be a bog on Gold Cup day, if accurate.

Cheltenham
2018-03-13 - Cheltenham
Updated - March 12th 2018, 8:04:09 am

Heavy soft, in places.

WEATHER
8 minutes ago Mar 12 - 08:04:09
Cheltenham
2018-03-13 - Cheltenham
Updated - March 12th 2018, 8:04:09 am

10mm overnight with further rain anticipated through the day (3 to 4mm) . Tuesday mostly dry, temps 10/11C

just laid soft @ 2.08 had to throw away the green to avoid been facked

rain today, can't see there being time for it to turned around

STRATFOED 30 miles away has a further precautionary inspection at 10.30 for racing today.

*StratFORD

Be amazed if Plumpton is on.
Not far away here and its p1ssed down all night,and supposed to be all day today.

It absolutely bucketed it down all last night. Heavy ground now and plenty more today. It's going to be absolutely bottomless, if it's not waterlogged.

Been chipping away at heavy since Saturday morning from 7/1 downwards, having already taken some double figure prices last week as s stakes saver, such that I had balanced my book between soft and heavy when I went to bed last night.
But then after getting up at 6.00am this morning to see how wet it had been overnight and was still coming down I took the remaining odds agaisnt (got a decent bit on at 2.4 ) that was still available on here and then took some 1.8-2.0 after Claisse announced officially it had gone heavy.

Just praying it isn't abandoned.

Im praying it is

I think I'd rather it was. I look forward to this week all year and soft ground I wouldn't mind, but the mess we're going to get certainly dampens the spirits.

Can't say I'm particularly looking forward to a Heavy ground Festival. The going will be a great leveler and lots of slow boats will be winning.

entries just coming in for Wednesday - the Ballymore only has 14 runners entered from a possible 22 .

Lets hope teh festival is isn't completely wiped out - I think Alan King has take loads out this morning from several races too

They will get all your going bet money back with form going out the window on it.

Day 1 abandoned meeting moved forwards by one day Gold Cup on Saturday

Not funny STS

I really hope it's not abandoned - I'm on my way to the airport and am only able to go tomorrow!

What'd happen with the antepost bets (here and elsewhere) if the entire meeting was abandoned?

good question impossible,

I'm not actually sure. A friend of mine walked the course earlier and it was a complete bog. Hope it goes ahead though.

Claisse has been reported to say 17 mins ago there will be no problem tomorrow unless something completely untoward happens that the weathermen have not forecast.

Meant to be dry and bright tomorrow so hopefully that should enable the worst areas to recover enough.

still raining 8 miles from track

Very happy to hear this - my friend told me to stay at home! I told him that he was just been a drama queen.

Sorry if I caused confusion - my reply was to Uncle - yeah it's horrible out there

Is there an early "precautionary inspection" called ?

Not yet

No, not even planned unless something completely untoward that forecasters have not predicted eg a monsoon.

Agreed - all systems go - albeit on vert testing conditions

very not vert (apologies to the frenchies!)

I’ve been here all day and hadn’t stopped raining. Find it impossible to believe it won’t be heavy, but listening to this it sounds like soft might still be the winner!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=EGUjVVyyqNY

Cheltenham.
Next Race Meeting 13/03/2018
Report Date 12/03/2018 15:45:00
Official Going Heavy Soft in places.
GoingStick 5.3 on Monday at 15:00
Rails Race 1: As advertised Race 2: As advertised Race 3: As advertised Race 4: As advertised Race 5: As advertised Race 6: Stud Chase Bend dolled out 6 yards, adding 19 yards, the start has been moved forward 23 yards, actual distance run is 3m 7f 166yds Race 7: Stud Chase Bend dolled out 6 yards, adding 19 yards, the start has been moved forward 23 yards, actual distance run is 2m 4f 74yds
Weather:
14mm in the last 24 hours, rain expected to peter out by dusk. Tuesday mostly dry, temps 10/11C.

That reading is the lowest for well over a year

and with it likely to be slowly drying out during the day tomorrow you can only imagine the gluepot conditions you will be faced with.

Proper heavy ground grinders will be the order of the day.

It will be nothing like the soft newbury ground murphys horse skidded through in the betfair.

Can't Catch Me    12 Mar 18 17:10 
I’ve been here all day and hadn’t stopped raining. Find it impossible to believe it won’t be heavy, but listening to this it sounds like soft might still be the winner!


The video shows standing water on the track and it’s still raining yet he says it is borderline soft/heavy.

Guy is clearly dressing it up big style but given that I have rebacked a bit of soft at 11/8-13/8 to balance things.

This is going to turn into a farce Going to be a lot of happy bookies come Friday,championship racing,well it ain’t now , heavy is heavy ok with that ,but the structure of of the course, temperatures, longer daylight hours, pace of races,like watching ants trying to climb out of honey

Mud lover or not , horse with the biggest heart wins, 8\1 the field over all races

according to cleeve hill weather site around 6 mm since this mornings update @ 8:00  cant see a cat in hells chance that changing now

Regretting going now the weather is lousy. Couple of grand for a fortnight in the sun for the same price as a few days in a wet uk would have been a good idea.

Could be my last visit the build up announcements have been bad enough now the weather is probably going to affect results and be wet and windy.

With a dry sunny forecast it’s nailed on to be changed to soft, heavy in places by lunchtime tomorrow. Purely a commercial / public relations decision rather than anything to do with the state of the track.

heres hoping!!
Has it stopped raining yet??

Still p*ssing and ominous skies - just pleased its not going to be abandoned from the earlier youtube message

Tep, still raining quite hard

Thanks for the updates

Latest update... could go either way:-

UPDATED 6:44PM, MAR 12 201

It rained through the night and it rained through the day, but Cheltenham clerk of the course Simon Claisse on Monday insisted the opening card of the 2018 festival is in absolutely no danger.

For the first time since 1982 the sport's biggest meeting is set to start with the word heavy in the official going description after 14mm of rain in the space of 24 hours.

The last time any festival day was staged on heavy ground was 1989.

Claisse, who posted an official going description of heavy, soft in places, said: "There is nothing in the forecast that would make us think there is any concern or doubt about the meeting tomorrow. That just doesn't enter our thinking.


"There was actually a temptation when I walked it at lunchtime to reverse the description to soft, heavy in places, because we'd had a drier spell, but the forecast suggested further rain, which has come this afternoon.

"Even so, the description is pretty borderline, so we'll see what happens overnight. It's forecast to be dry and we're then looking forward to a dry Tuesday with temperatures up to 11C or 12C. If we think it has dried out in the morning, or even up to 1.30pm, we can flip it back to soft, heavy in places."

Outlining the longer-term forecast, Claisse added: "We may get up to another 8mm or 9mm as we go from Wednesday into Thursday, but on Thursday we open up the New course and have a wide area of fresh hurdle and chase ground. The two tracks walk very similar, although there is a bit more fresh ground on the New course."


Reflecting on the racing surface being softer than for any festival in modern history, Claisse added: "I have done 19 festivals and we've been incredibly lucky with the weather.

"Some people have said we might not see soft or heavy at the festival again due to our drainage, but I've always held the view that if you get sufficient rain in close proximity to racing you'll get soft or heavy ground. That's what has happened.


"We've had about 45mm of rain in the last ten days on ground that had been frozen in places the week before. When you get frost in the ground it tends to open it up and a smaller amount of rain makes the ground more testing.

"However, we've seen through November, December and January that jockeys are brilliant at riding according to the conditions. We still had wonderful finishes then and I'm sure it will be the same throughout this week."

The rain all day has not affected the going though and in fact it has improved and soft is now long odds on favourite.

Incredible, I arrived this morning and once he annouced heavy at 9.00am and the fact that it has hardly stopped all day, I could not see how it could not be heavy.  Still perplexed

Weather forecast for tomorrow has been changed to "possible showers" after news broke that Jamie Carragher was planning to go racing.

It has been raining really hard off and on all day how the hell can it be anything other than heavy

Cleeve Hill weather station shows theres more rain from his 8:00 am update than there was thro last night.
https://cleeve-weather.grg.org.uk/weather.php?date=Today

whatever  he says tommorow i am treating it as heavy !

11mm at cleeve hill today, 4mm from mid afternoon after that video
nothing tomorrow

going stick 5.3

its heavy ground

can someone tell me when was the last year the going was heavy at the Cheltenham Festival?

1982 was the last time he started on heavy, I wasn't even born ffs

pre all the drainage work & the current watering regime

1982 was the last time he started on heavy
claisse is old but he aint that fkin old

Seem to recall Desert Orchid winning in desperate conditions and it snowing when The Thinker won.

funnily enough he didnt mention the watering policy as a reason for the ground issues

sry the meeting started on heavy

Been looking at YT.  The Thinker won in the snow but the going was good.  Last time the going was heavy for The Gold Cup was when Dessie won in 1989.  Only 5 finishers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hsau32l_vYI

The day Dessie won when the going was heavy there were two 66/1 winners.  Winning ditsnaces in 4 of the 6 races were 6 lengths or more (so WH high 5 offer might be good).  In the 3 staying chases that day there were only 17 finishers from 45 runners

Heavy also on Champion Chase day in 1988.  15 Finishers from 42 runners in the two staying chases.  Four of the 6 winners that day were double figure prices (other 2 were faves) but the biggest priced winner was only 16/1.  4 of the 6 races won by 5l or more, thus qualifying you for WH's 15% bonus.

Well at 6.55am Soft was at 1.28 with heavy at 2.5

When I got back from my dog walk at 7.25am soft was now over 3 and heavy into 1.36.

Presumably there has been an announcement but he can still change it after a sunny morning.

https://twitter.com/CheltenhamRaces

Video from Claisse at 7.00am says it is heavy, soft in places. Stopped raining at 1.00am.
No mention that it might improve to soft through the morning or that they could take another look - do I trust him and go all in on heavy (not that would be enouhg liquidity in my case)?

It looks like Simon made the right call - he would just have been exposing himself to ridicule otherwise

Racing Post with two contradictory posts:

One saying no expectation of the ging be flipped round:

Tuesday morning, clerk of the course Simon Claisse said: "It's been dry overnight and we are expecting a dry day, although as I say that there is a shower happening.

"We remain heavy, soft in places."

The end of the back straight, up and over the hill and the bottom of the old hill are the areas where the ground is soft, rather than heavy.

Claisse does not expect any change to underfoot conditions before the roar of the Cheltenham crowd greets the runners for the Sky Bet Supreme Novices' Hurdle, and added: "The forecast is dry so we're just counting  down the hours until 1.30."

But on their live feed they have a tweet from Betfred at 7.40am that says:

Going is Heavy (soft in places) but CoC Simon Claisse suggests that could be flipped around as the opener approaches

Mick Fitz says it's the softest in his 25 years walking it yesterday at 5.30, nobody allowed walk the course this morning

Market on here all over the place - soft is now back into 11/8 (last matched at 2.32) having gone out to 3/1.

Doesn't exactly look bottomless, but definitely don't want to be going off like a train

14 secs slow
10.40 secs slow


ground is soft imo

Just glad it was called heavy.

Well they certainly arent heavy ground times.

Well nobody saw this coming did they? Simon calling soft ground heavy

Noel Fehily quote last night "The ground started out ok on Tuesday but it got worse as the day progressed and Wednesday will be a struggle."

Presumably getting well churned up - they showed the divots on ITV after the first and they were massive.

Going to have a deluge of rain overnight.

Simon Claisse: "I'd been tempted to change the going on the New course to Soft, Good to Soft in places, but I've left it as it is - Soft, Heavy in places and it will probably stay like that."


wtf ??

well that doesn't make any sense

another 10mm overnight

walked the dog just now in a field 1 mile from the course it is much softer than yesterday