Mark Wallis’ frustration at the failure of Romford to fill a hurdle open on Friday, brought into greater focus the situation regarding jump-racing writes Floyd Amphlett.
The expense of schooling, the unsuitability of many dogs to perform over the sticks, and the stigma associated with some of the ‘characters’ of the sport all work against hurdle racing.
Once runners of a particular type are in a minority, events get cancelled and a vicious circle of missed opportunities and availability soon builds.
It wasn’t always so. In the early days of the sport, half of meeting might be set aside for hurdle racing.
Back in my days as a White City kennel lad, most eight race cards would have one or two hurdle events.
The fact that I worked for Tommy Foster, who specialised in jumpers, seems to have rubbed off on me, as well as his son Jason, who was just a pup at the time.
So what is the reality?
On Sunday, Sittingbourne will stage the 44th hurdle open of the year. Despite the perception, hurdle racing has not declined significantly in the last five years, as the comparison (to the same date) demonstrates.
| 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | |
| Coventry 480mH | 14 | ||||
| Crayford 380mH | 6 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 5 |
| Crayford 540mH | 4 | 7 | 5 | 7 | 9 |
| Hall Green 480mH | 1 | 2 | |||
| Hove 515mH | 4 | 1 | 7 | 3 | |
| Romford 400mH | 1 | 6 | 10 | 1 | 13 |
| Sheffield 500mH | 1 | 1 | |||
| Sittingbourne 480mH | 8 | 12 | 3 | 7 | 5 |
| Wimbledon 480mH | 21 | 29 | 10 | 10 | 12 |
| Total | 44 | 58 | 45 | 37 | 50 |
While Romford is clearly on the back foot, others have raised their game and there is only a small variation in the numbers.
It is only if you look further back, do you see how much hurdling has declined.
Back in 2005, there were exactly 101 opens during the same period and the breakdown of where they were staged says so much about the industry in general.
21-Wimbledon 460mH, 15-Romford 400mH, 14-Reading 465mH, 13-Walthamstow 475mH, 10-Romford 575mH, 7-Perry Barr 480mH, 6-Crayford 540mH, 4-Belle Vue 465mH, 3-Crayford 380mH, Walthamstow 640mH, 1-Hall Green 480mH, Oxford 450mH, Perry Barr 660mH, Wimbledon 660mH.
There were more tracks, more staging hurdle racing, and even a decent sprinkling over six-bend hurdles.
And for those who say ‘yes there were bound to be more because there was more racing’, the facts are, we were dealing with 1,902 races compared to 1,532.
So the percentage of hurdle races has fallen from 5.29% to 2.87%.
Some, including many of my journalist colleagues, might argue – does it really matter? You are dealing with large numbers of ‘screws’ and bad racing.
It is not a doctrine that I subscribe to, on three grounds.
1) On a welfare/practical point of view, is it not best to give every greyhound an opportunity of a career? Many dogs unsuitable for flat racing have perfectly good hurdles careers.
2) There are currently a lot of ungenuine dogs to whom racing managers turn a blind eye, but make for bad racing. Years ago, most RMs would insist on certain dogs being tried over the jumps if they wished to carry on with their careers at that track.
3 Nothing excites a novice race-goer more than seeing six hounds clear the brush at 35mph. Hurdle racing is one of the most spectacular sights in racing and as industry striving to remain vibrant and interesting to the general public, can we really afford to turn our back on it?
