Salisbury lose Dick Poole card for second successive season

Salisbury has felt the full force of the weather and has been forced to abandon their early-September Dick Poole card for the second year in a row due to waterlogging.

The Wiltshire track lost the seven-race fixture, which has the Group Three juvenile event as its feature, on the day of racing 12 months ago, but this time around the action has been curtailed over 24 hours before it was due to take place with the course failing a 9am inspection on Wednesday following significant rainfall.

Salisbury clerk of the course Jeremy Martin said: “The abandonment is a great disappointment to everyone here and it is actually the second year in a row we have lost our main meeting of the season.

“It is of a consequence of around 60mm of rain in the last six days and of course we raced on Friday August 29 on ground that was practically soft.

“Although we railed a lot of it off, there is still plenty of the course that we can’t avoid like either side of the fibresand crossing, the dips and the lower areas of the dips between the four furlong marker and the two and a half.

“The ground there is very wet and they are areas which are unstable, and likewise in the last furlong, it can’t be avoided.

“The weather has changed quickly in the last week, we’ve had a lot of rain and there is more forecast throughout today and during the night, with potential for another 10-15mm.

“With that in mind there was no way the areas that were giving me concern were going to get better, they were only going to get worse, so it was in everybody’s interest we made an early decision and people could make other plans.

“We’re very disappointed as it’s a great card. I’ve been here 25 years and prior to last year we had never lost this fixture and now we’ve lost it two years in a row. It’s very disappointing and the rains have definitely arrived with a vengeance after five months of lovely sunny weather.”

Last year’s Dick Poole was rearranged for Salisbury’s Friday evening fixture just over a week later and officials are hopeful a similar arrangement could be made this time around.

Martin continued: “In terms of rescheduling the Dick Poole, I need to have a conversation with the BHA, there is the option of moving it to next Friday if everybody is willing to pull together.

“That will be something I will be working on today and it worked last year so let’s hope we can make it work this year.

“Last year when we rearranged we had a nice winner in Tabiti and next Friday is a seven-race card so hopefully the Dick Poole can be added to it.”