Mark Johnstone moans.....again!

The Scottish Windbag has yet again had a moan,this time about the state of the ground at the Ebor meeting.He declared it "atrocious" and "beyond belief that top class jockeys had to go searching for the best strip from race to race".He claims that the false surface was due to overdiligance with the watering and he laid the blame squarely on the shoulders of the clerk of the course,he issued a statement rambling on about courses being petrified of having "firm" anywhere in their going description and that the courses should leave most of the watering to the good Lord above etc etc etc.Personally i thought York produced a fairly level field in that horses with a variety of run styles were successful,years gone by have seen anything that gets in front at the top of the straight was almost assured of victory(almost dog track like), although it has to be said that the draw had more than a little effect on some events.The ground IS the single most important factor in any race,forget trip,weight,course configuration,recent form etc etc,if your animal doesnt go on the ground then its all over before its started,with all of the above in mind i have always been in the camp of "what will be will be,dont water to alter,only water to maintain".Some horses love a bog and they get their ground regularly at the beginning and end of the season but what about the real "daisycutters" who love it like a road? They get next to nothing,in many ways i agree with the comments of Mark Johnstone but i think he could have chosen his words a shade more diplomatically and instead of pointing the finger at York he should have pointed it at all of the big Festival tracks because lets be honest Ascot on the straight track can vary from race to race never mind day to day or meeting to meeting.A casing point being the King George of a few seasons back(Dylan Thomas') when the ground was "good to soft,soft in places,good with good to firm patches in the straight"!!!!!!!
What Mark Johnstone was surely trying to say was all tracks need to get their house in order as to the standard of surface they produce but this leads to how many fixtures they put on which leads to the over clogged fixture list which leads to how much money they need to produce... in other word a nasty circle that doesnt end.In an ideal world we would race less and therfore produce better ground.Sounds simple.

I got the impression he was moaning as all his horses were losing!

I don't remember him moaning at Ascot where he had a good week, and the ground conditions were all over the place that week.

I agree with you about ground conditions. I certainly look at that first before considering how good a horse is over the trip, weight etc.

I also agree with your last point - there must be less races and that it turn would produce better ground. i understand that there are going to be 80 less race meetings next year. I still don't think that goes far enough. Start at cutting 200 and then you might get somewhere!

Too many meetings on too many courses that are dual purpose or race all year leads to bad ground.Look at places like Towcester,Leicester,Sedgefield and a few others,they all water to get so called "safe" ground in the Summer but when the Autumn rains come you get horribly false ground.Two seasons ago Sedgefield was producing some of the worst ground that id seen in my racing lifetime,all stemming from watering for "Summer Jumping".ATR ran a little piece with the Leicester clerk of the course a while back and he admitted that since it became the courses right to notify the powers that be about when they can stage meetings,his job had become nigh on imposssible.If i remember rightly Leicester had 26 meetings pencilled in for that calender year,how can you get decent ground with that much racing? Ground needs time to recover,all you end up with if you dont is a bog in the Winter and a road in the Summer.I love racing but 8 and 9 meetings a day on some Summer Saturdays is certainly too much of a good thing.

I agree with a certain amount of watering to ensue safe ground for 'Summer Jumping' but why so much 'watering' for flat racing .

I would feel that having quick fast ground would be a good thing for flat racing especially 'straight racing' under a mile considering it is based on speed.

Now we don't want to see horses suffering from 'jarring' but i would off the top of my head consider that at least 70% of flat horses would be able to handle good to firm ground.


For example has there been a multiple group one winner (lets say 5+) who had to run on exclusively soft ground and never won or ran on ground no better than yielding.

I can understand classic/cup distance flat horses and nh horses needing certain conditions to thrive as stamina would be a prerequisite at that level but surely sprinters or milers on the flat at a high level(Group level) should be able to at best run to a certain level on ground faster than yielding.

Perhaps i'm being cruel on soft ground flat horses or ignorant on horse welfare but in my 20+ years of watching racing its a question that has always intrigued me.