Breeding & Racing in Germany
David Conolly-Smith: www.galoppfoto.de - Frank SorgeIn order to be of assistance to our growing number of readers from abroad, we are with immediate effect publishing in every issue of Turf Times an English page, giving in compact form all the latest racing and breeding news from Germany in English. It will be written by the well-known racing journalist David Conolly-Smith, who has lived in Germany for many years. He is the German representative of the International Racing Bureau and writes regularly on German racing and breeding for the Racing Post, Irish Field, EBN, TRC and many other publications.
After the successful resumption of German racing a fortnight ago, we had an equally successful second week of racing – all behind closed doors, of course - with Munich staging racing last Friday with Düsseldorf on Saturday and Cologne on Sunday. All these fixtures also proceeded well with no problems, and it is clear that we are going to have to get used to this kind of racing with no spectators, strict distancing and jockeys wearing face masks for quite a long time to come. Germany appears to be coping much better with the coronavirus crisis than most other countries and restrictions are very slowly being relaxed. The German racing authorities have now published a provisional list of fixtures up to the end of August, and it is expected that all these meetings will still be held behind closed doors, although it is possible that slightly more people will at some stage be allowed on to the racecourse, e.g. owners, although always under strict conditions.
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These are difficult times for almost everybody, but it must be said that the past week has been very positive for the German racing and breeding industries. On the one hand, there have been some good results for German-bred runners and stallions in several different countries, and on the other, the resumption of racing after a two month break last week in Hanover (Thursday), Cologne (Friday), Mülheim (Saturday) and Hoppegarten (Sunday) must be regarded as a complete success.
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„Equal goes it loose“ was the phrase which German president Heinrich Lübcke – according to legend- uttered to Queen Elizabeth II on the occasion of her state visit to Germany in 1965. What he meant to say was: “It is about to start now”. And that is the situation in which we now find ourselves. As your correspondent pens these lines, it is only a few minutes before racing starts at Hanover, the first race meeting on German soil since the coronavirus lockdown came into effect in March. In fact the first racing in any major European country, as France is due to resume on Monday and there are still no definite dates for the U.K. and Ireland. Indeed the Irish government has suggested that racing will only be allowed again at the end of June, which would be a disaster for the Irish racing industry, although it seems possible that June 8th could also see a resumption of racing there, while the U.K.
weiterlesen »Thoroughbred racing continues all round the world at present, but almost all races are run behind closed doors, including in such major areas as Japan, Hong Kong, and most of Australia and the United States. Betting is almost all online, and some communities seem to handle this better than others; Japan, for example, reports that turnover is running at over 80% of its normal level (and that is astronomically high, by our standards).
weiterlesen »We are now approaching the end of April, a time of year when normally the flat season would be in full swing in most European countries, especially with an eye on the first classics. The Craven meeting at Newmarket, for example, should have taken place last week but was of course cancelled. In Germany the first big classic trial would normally be the Dr. Busch-Memorial at Krefeld, originally scheduled for this Sunday and the Bavarian Classic at Munich on the Friday of next week, May Day. The former race is now to be run at Hoppegarten on May 10th, while it was hoped to run the Munich race, now possibly retitled Cologne Classic, at Cologne on May 3rd, together with the Carl Jaspers-Preis (ex-Gerling-Preis), the first major event of the season for older horses.
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The executive committee of Deutscher Galopp (aka Direktorium) is meeting later today (Thursday) to decide the timetable for the next few weeks of racing in Germany. Their decisions will not be known until after these lines are written, but it is already clear that the revised schedule published just over a week ago was too optimistic and several changes will have to be made. The German government announced yesterday (Wednesday) that the current restrictions will remain in place until May 3rd at least, so that it is extremely unlikely that the original plan to race at Hanover on May 1st and at Cologne, with two important group races, on May 3rd can be maintained.
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Covid-19 continues to spread all around the world, and virtually no area is now free of this disease and almost every country has placed severe restrictions on the movement of people, including going shopping or socializing. There are still new and increased numbers of infections and deaths reported every day, however there are signs in several European countries (including Germany) that the rate of increase has flattened and that the situation is slowly beginning to improve. The German government is due to discuss the current state of affairs next Wednesday and it seems quite likely that some restrictions will be eased, e.g. that some shops or small restaurants will be allowed to reopen.
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The coronavirus crisis continues to affect us all and in all our activities, including sport in general and horse racing in particular. Obviously the chances of any racing taking place anywhere in the world with spectators present are virtually nil at present, but racing is continuing behind closed doors in Japan, Hong Kong and some parts of Australia and the USA.
Trotting from Sweden (a country where life seems strangely to be going on as normal) is at the moment the only action in Europe, but there could be light at the end of the tunnel, as racing authorities in the U.K., France and also Germany have announced their intention of allowing racing to resume at the beginning of May, just in time for the Guineas Meeting at Newmarket. All April racing has been abandoned, including the Grand National meeting at Aintree and later in the month the Punchestown Festival, so that the 2019-20 N.H. season in the U.K. and Ireland is now effectively over.
weiterlesen »With the coronavirus continuing to spread all over the world, racing – in common with almost all other sports - has been suspended in most countries or only takes place behind closed doors or under very strict conditions. Football is by far the most popular sport in most countries, both in terms of the number of spectators and of media coverage, but racing comes second (at a distance) in many areas.
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The rapid spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus in Europe is causing major problems for all spectator sports, and racing is no exception. All racing in France and the U.K. has been suspended, while Ireland has imposed strict conditions with racing going on behind closed doors and not even the owners allowed to be present. In this country, the earliest possible date for racing to be resumed is April 19th, when the Frühjahrs-Meile at Düsseldorf, the first group race of the German season, will we hope be run behind closed doors. It must be hoped that the situation will be back to normal by May, when there is a full programme including several group races and classic trials, the popular Irish Race Day at Hoppegarten on the 10th, the first classic, the Mehl-Mülhens-Renen (2,000 Guineas) at Cologne on the 17th and the Baden-Baden Spring Meeting from the 21st to the 24th.
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Germany´s winter season ended last Sunday with the last meeting on the sand track at Dortmund until winter returns in December. The outstanding feature was clearly the victory of Gestüt Ebbesloh´s homebred Inaugural (Soldier Hollow) in the 3yo “maiden” (i.e. maidens on the all-weather, the first two to finish had both won on turf as 2yo´s last year). Inaugural had shown some smart form in 2019, including a fifth place in the Herzog von Ratibor-Rennen and was the clear favourite here; he was also Peter Schiergen´s first runner of the year in Germany, although the Cologne trainer had had a couple of winners at the St. Moritz meeting last month.
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We have to start this week´s column with an apology, as last week´s article failed to appear as a result of computer problems and the technical incompetence of your correspondent.
Admittedly we did not miss too much, as the racing scene remains very quiet in Germany with only low level Sunday cards on Dortmund´s sand track to keep us going at home. This Sunday´s meeting will be the last winter fixture of the year, and the following week “proper” racing resumes with a much stronger card at Cologne; the weather remains wet and windy, but spring is definitely coming.
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