CHELTENHAM SET FOR BUMPER DAY
Cheltenham is expecting the busiest day in its history today with ten races featuring on a rescheduled card.
High winds across the South of England yesterday caused race organisers to call-off the second day of the Cheltenham Festival amid safety concerns over the temporary marquees, with Wednesday's race-card being rescheduled for today in what is expected to be a bumper day for punters and race organisers.
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Around �300m is expected to be wagered by horse racing betting fans today alone - around half of the forecasted total amount for the whole festival although with the Denman - Kauto Star rivalry taking centre stage on Friday in the Gold Cup, the �600m estimate looks set to be surpassed.
Estimates have however put the cost of yesterday's cancellation at between �1.5m and �2m, with 55,000 ticket holders to be issued refunds although organisers have increased the courses by more than 10,000 to around 65,000 for Thursday's meet.
Cheltenham defended their decision to cancel the day's racing, which had been criticised as an "overreaction" in some quarters.
Course Managing Director Edward Gillespie said: "We came in at 5am and found that the forecast was for winds gusting up to 50mph," he said. "The significance of that is that at 50mph many of our temporary structures in the village and Best Mate enclosure cannot be occupied.
"There would be around 10,000 people in each, and many others very close to those areas with a similar level of risk. We could not invite people on to this site as we could not guarantee their safety.
The official weather forecast has improved for the final two days of the meeting, with much lighter winds expected.
Clerk of the course Simon Claisse said: "It will be a challenging couple of days but we're looking forward to it.
"We're fine here this morning, it's mostly cloudy and we might get a little light shower but we haven't got any of those winds."
Thursday's feature races are the Queen Mother Champion Chase at 2:20 and the World Hurdle at 3:30.
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