The English page - Still a long way from “normal”

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 10^th, while it was hoped to run the Munich race, now possibly retitled Cologne Classic, at Cologne on May 3^rd, together with the Carl Jaspers-Preis (ex-Gerling-Preis), the first major event of the season for older horses.

However the German government has extended the current lockdown (quite correctly in most people´s view) to May 3^rd, so that racing –even behind closed doors- was looking unlikely for the revised fixtures at Hanover (with 3 listed races) on May 1^st, Mannheim on the 2^nd and Cologne. That was officially confirmed today (Thursday) by Deutscher Galopp, and it is now expected –or rather. hoped, that racing will resume on May 4^th at Dortmund, and that the three earlier fixtures will now be staged later in the same week. It is certainly unusual for black type events to be run on normal working days in Germany, but as Deutscher Galopp supremo Michael Vesper explained, as these races are being run without racegoers, it does not really make much difference.

All races up to mid-June will be behind closed doors, but it is hoped that all races can be streamed live and free of cost on the internet. There will be no on course betting, but there will be betting online and all major German bookmakers have agreed to blow all bets into the theoretical course tote and also to waive their usual commission, thus creating one hopes a realistic betting market. This will be an important factor in the financing of racing during the period when racecourses have to survive without gate money, catering profits and quite probably major sponsorship deals as well. The message is to bet as much as possible, and as punters have been starved of betting opportunities for the past six weeks, there could well be a significant increase in off track betting, especially as the meetings which will be held could have up to twelve races each race day and that there will only be one fixture per day.

Of course racing does not exist in a vacuum and has to keep an eye on what other countries are doing, and also other sports. Such events as Wimbledon and the Tour de France, both normally starting in late June, not to mention Euro 2020 and the Olympic Games, have already been cancelled or postponed until 2021, together with such events as the Oktoberfest in Munich (which actually takes place mainly in September), the Oberammergau Passion Play and the Bayreuth and Salzburg Opera Festivals. The sport which is by far the most popular and therefore important in Europe is clearly football, and there are indications that the German professional league (Bundesliga) could resume on May 9^th, obviously without spectators, but that is still better than nothing. Racing behind closed doors already took place for a few days in March in both Ireland and France, and is still continuing under these conditions in Hong Kong, Japan, Australia and some areas of the U.S.A. On the whole these meetings can be regarded as successful, even though the atmosphere is obviously missing, so racing is clearly possible.

In France it has now been officially confirmed that racing can resume on May 11^th, although foreign runners and riders will not be allowed to take part before the end of May. Ireland is also hoping to resume in early May, but the British have not yet specified when they will resume, but is hoped to be in May and the big Merano spring meeting in Italy is also expected to go ahead in May. Obviously the dates from some of the top races will have to be changed, but it is hope that most of them will still be run, albeit at a later date and almost certainly reduced prize-money. The first European Group One race of the season is Longchamp´s Prix Ganay; this was originally scheduled for this Sunday, but could now be run on the day that racing resumes in France, May 11^th. The first British Group One is the Lockinge Stakes at Newbury on May 16^{th, but it}  will certainly not be run on that date and will quite possibly simply be cancelled.

The Newmarket Guineas meeting on the first weekend in May will probably now be run a month later, and that of course means that the Epsom Derby meeting will also take place a month later. The current expectation is that the Derby, and possibly the Oaks as well, will be run on Saturday July 4^th, while the French Derby (Prix du Jockey Club) and Oaks (Prix de Diane) will both be run on Sunday July 5^th. This is also the scheduled date for the German Derby on the final day of the week long Hamburg meeting, while the Irish Derby is due a week earlier. It is clearly not ideal for the German Derby to be run on the same weekend as the equivalent races in England and France, so it seems quite likely that the Hamburg meeting will be reduced, possibly to three days, and staged on the weekend of July 10^th-12^th, with the Derby therefore a week later than originally planned.

Basically it is impossible currently to make concrete plans for more than a few days in advance as the coronavirus situation remains fluid – or “dynamic” as the politicians like to say. At the moment the situation, at least in Germany, is gradually improving; the increase in the number of new infections, and also deaths, is clearly slowing down, and that is also so in Italy and Spain, where they had far more cases. But of course a sudden deterioration – or even the dreaded “second wave” – would lead to an immediate clampdown and probably the cancellation of all sporting events until the autumn or even longer. As it is, all major spectator events in Germany are banned up to the end of August, and although nobody has yet defined precisely what constitutes a major event, that would certainly also refer to the top race meetings.

As it is, we must just hope for the best. Certainly the German government seems to have handled the situation well – certainly much better than has been the case in the U.K. and U.S.A. – and likewise the racing authorities here, who have been much more open and transparent than their equivalents in the U.K. and France. So we look forward to racing behind closed doors in Germany – including several black type events- taking place the week after next, and hope to be able to give a preview here next week.

David Conolly-Smith