Dunguib to race on Wednesday's free card

FAIRYHOUSE RESCHEDULED: RACING FANS could get a chance to see the brilliant Dunguib in action for free at Fairyhouse on Wednesday after yesterday's cancelled triple Grade One card was rescheduled.

The deplorable weather that hit the east coast on Saturday night through to yesterday resulted in Fairyhouse’s “Winter Festival” programme being cancelled and postponed for 72 hours.

Horse Racing Ireland authorities have taken the decision to give free admission for all customers on Wednesday if the meeting gets the go-ahead. “Monday is due to be a dry and bright day but there is more rain forecast for Tuesday. We are being told to expect about 10mm at most, so we are hopeful,” said Fairyhouse manager Caroline Gray yesterday.

However, the weather forecasters were caught out in a big way at the weekend with Fairyhouse getting caught up in the horrendous rainfall that affected eastern counties.

“Nothing like this was forecast,” said Gray. “By 7.30am, 12mm had fallen and by 8.15am, when Joe Collins (clerk of the course) had a look at it, another 10mms had fallen,” Gray said.

“We have taken the decision to give free admission because with the fog that was here on Saturday our loyal racegoers haven’t had a chance to see any racing this weekend,” she explained.

However, the move to Wednesday will have an impact on crowd figures. A crowd of up to 6,000 was expected to attend yesterday, but that the attendance figure could drop to approximately 2,000 in the middle of the week, according to Gray.

Dunguib was a 2 to 5 favourite for the Bar One Racing Royal Bond Novice Hurdle and was already on the road for the Co Meath track when news of the cancellation came through to his trainer Philip Fenton.Yesterday, however, Fenton confirmed that the principal attraction at the prestigious card will be at Fairyhouse if racing goes ahead.

“It must have been deplorable ground after so much rain,” the Co Tipperary-based trainer said. “The plan is to run. He’ll do what he always does with a routine canter tomorrow and he should be fine.”

In 2006, the Winter Festival card was moved to the following Wednesday when the Sunday card was called off after just two races due to high winds. On that occasion, Brave Inca ended up landing the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle under Tony McCoy.

Fairyhouse were due to race on Wednesday anyway but the original card has been moved to December 10th in order to allow the rescheduling of the triple Grade One fixture which is worth almost €350,000 in prize-money.

As well as the Royal Bond, the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle and the Drinmore Chase, both worth €85,000 each, are due to be run.