UPDATED! YARMOUTH CHANGE GEARS/GEORGE ING LEGER (FULL FORM)

A staged return to normality begins next Wednesday at Yarmouth Photo: Steve Nash

In the space of a few days, greyhound racing at Yarmouth Stadium will go from second gear into overdrive.

On Monday, the track stage the opening round of the George Ing St.Leger, when they are also due to make their first scheduled appearance on the SKY Racing Channel.

Although most of the country will move into the lower stage of the pandemic lockdown on that day, Yarmouth will welcome crowds back for the Wednesday meeting. Three days later, a regular Saturday fixture returns to the schedule.

Promoter Simon Franklin said: “We are due on Sky Racing for the heats and semi finals, on successive Mondays. I’m waiting to hear back whether or not the final meeting will be televised on the Saturday.

“We haven’t gone with readmission to the public on Monday because there have been some alterations in conditions.

“The restrictions between tables have been reduced from two metres to a metre so we have been re-jigging the restaurant. At normal capacity it is 240. When we had the first restrictions, it took us down to 140, but we should be okay for 170 going forward. Obviously there are several restrictions still in place.

“Overall our capacity is limited to 450 and once again there are restrictions. Basically, we have to bring drinks and bets to the punters.”

The third generation track boss is hoping that the seaside resort can bounce back with a good summer.

He said: “Everything in the town is completely booked solid. We have the Bank Holiday weekend coming up and our bookings are already looking very good.

“Whether the Saturdays can break even we are yet to find out though hopefully life will get a lot easier if normality really does return from June 21.

We certainly plan to keep them going through to the winter. If business drops of a cliff in January, we may close for a month but we’ll play it by ear.”