Nottingham Racecourse To Be Sold?

Would imagine if that goes so does the dog track which is right next door

Hopefully they bring back national hunt racing it was a superb jumps track

Not a fan of the track, get some houses on it. A few tracks need to go, Leicester must be on the list

A few will follow imv….

Nottingham is a good track imv,shame it could be sold….

Could you not just go to either of them and allow them who do enjoy going to continue going.

Too many tracks, inevitably that 2 or 3 will close in the next few years.

Haven't been since Noddy's Ryde in 84.

Accomodation for the Orcs !

Saw Lucius and Red Alligator win there. Was a great jump course and attracted top chasers.

Royal gait won there his next run he became champion hurdler.

I go to Nottingham for nearly every flat meeting and have done for 13  years now. Some observations from me as a result - in random order, 1 good, the rest bad.

1/ The track has been badly managed for a long while now. To start with, but not the major issue, there is not enough shelter form the rain for attendees - yet nothing ever done despite different general managers promising the issue would be looked at.

2/ Over watering on occassions has often led to heavier going than need be.

3/ Fair play to them for reducing the cost to £9 for every weekday meeting last year and this - at least they tried something.

4/ When I first went there after moving North in 2007, a lot of the old timers at the track maoaned about the demise of jump racing there and, listening to them, it appeared that was the point where the crowd levels began to drop. But that was a long while ago now and a great many of the old timers have gone to the great racertrack in the sky since then, so the end of jumping there cannot still be the reason the track now faces an uncerrtain future.

5/ Selling the track to Arena would be very positive. For all their faults, Arena run tracks considerably better than the often inept Jockey Club Racecourses do. The latter are, quite frnakly, hopeless at times.

6/ The council clearly have two choices. Either sell off for housing or to another racecourse provider (Arena). What would bring the council the most money, or would the amounts be the same? Also, would the council have to perform some hocus-pocus with their planning laws to allow housing on the site - after all, it is part of a park area (Colwick).

I hope the track continues because it remains a great place to go racing and I fear a domino effect if it does close. Should still have 3 more years yet, though.

it's one of the 'blandest' tracks in the country but still would rather it stayed open, relatively easy access once you get through the roundabout about half a mile from the track!  did the city trial and arkle trial races briefly move to wolverhampton after they gave up jumps? as below, being one of the old timers who much preferred it as a jumps track I haven't been for several years. I always prefer Leicester as a jumps track too although it's been heavy ground there for what seems like 5 years!!

Jumping at Nottingham was slightly before my time, but I do recall Sue Smith stating that it was a huge loss to the NH scene. I have heard that is rather soulless

Leicester appears to have fast ground on chase course and heavy on the hurdles track (or is it the other way around?). Always seems like the two courses are on a different level - perhaps that is why?

Leicester's 2 jumps courses are virtually separate, especially in the home straight. The chase course goes through a cutting which delivers a special vista of the action from a vantage point above on the grass bank.

Unfortunately the hurdle course doubles as the flat track and therefore suffers from the watering that takes place in the summer, hence the soft/heavy ground all winter.

I was at Leicester for the jumps Thursday just gone. I wasn't the only one pleasently surprised at how the going was not as bad for all the chase crad as we had been led to belive it was going to be.

Leiceser must be awfuly hard to manage because of the way the flat and chase tracks are situated, and how the track is only allowed to draw water form their source for certain periods of the year. I belive that the trsck sees the lowest going stick ratings of every course during every jumps season - I seem to remeber it being 2.9 once and yet they raced!!

Point number 5 the knight how sad it’s got to the stage when we would prefer arc to run a racecourse over jcr.

Cheltenham Racecourse is effectively an ARC course these days.

Since Ian Renton (ex ARC) took over the place and employed John Pullen (ex ARC) as COTC it has rapidly descended into a hospitality venue where food and drink have taken priority over the equine experience of a day in the countryside and a close up view of the horses and the racing.

Be careful what you wish for.

loper...as spmeopne who goes racing 200 times a year and has done so for 13 years now, I can only say that Arena courses are generally much better run than Jockey Club venues.

OK, Arena have plenty of faults but to start with my annual membership at Southwell is great value. Let's not forget that the best value in racing must be a membership at an Arena track because it gives you entrance to almost every other meeting at every other Arena track. Pity JCR have never tried to emulate that!

I am also a member at Beverley and Ponty, both independently run, and now Newamrket. The latter is Ok and good value because of the number of meetings across the two tracks but they mess around with small details there all the time. Beverley and Ponty are good and both eclipse anything JCR offer. For regualr racegoers like me, JCR often get it very wrong, I'm afraid.

Most really regular racegoers (although now an endangered group) will surely share my views on this.

As a regular racegoer I very much agree with The Knight.

Fair enough, The Knight.

But I'm not disputing the pricing or what racegoers perceive to be value, I'm merely pointing out the current route that racecourses (a generalisation I know) are going which is to corral visitors in to a hospitality facility filled with food drink and on line betting, keeping them away from the equine action under the guise of 'health & safety'. The bland offerings currently available take away from the unique atmosphere of what used to be the real racing experience.

A few years ago went on a Rtv club day. The management heard it was our 50 th wedding anniversary and sent down a bottle of champagne. Now that was real class.

Have to say that an example of how some JCR tracks are run less well than Arena is there for all to see today.

Huntingdon (JCR) is scheduled for Thursday. Up until yesterday, going was reported as Heavy - flooded in places. Today it is now Heavy - waterlooged in places.

Sandown was scheduled for the same day yet was waterlogged and had an inspection yesterday and sadly had to abandon. Now, these tracks are in the same JCR group, yet I cannot find any mention anywhere of an early inspection at Huntingodon for Thursday - or even any mention at all of the chances of racing there.

So either they are waiting to see and think it will be OK, or know full well already it wil be off. Either way, a public utterance about their chances of racing on Thursday would not come amiss.

Is it lack of knowekledge, nobody to do the job, or something else that prevents a tiny bit of common sense being shown?

(I shall go to Huntingdon if it is on, if not Sedgefield.)

The listed Further Flight Stakes named after Barry Hills great stayer, one of Nottingham's best races has this year been moved to Musselburgh's Easter fixture and will be named the Goliath Cup.

they had the kilvington on lockinge day as well
shame what's going on

I spoke to the course this morning , the COC was walking the track at the time.
It's raceable today I was told but a further 09.00 inspection tomorrow morning will decide if it's a goer or not. The rain forecast for today and all through the night is for relentless rain so it's going be be extremely heavy ground.

If I had to call it ,from what I've been told, it's odds against that the meeting goes ahead which will be hugely disappointing.