THE all-weather tracks at Dundalk and Chelmsford have come to the rescue of the flat racing season which faced an interrupted weekend due to incessant rain.

Today’s Cork card was lost to waterlogging but Horse Racing Ireland quickly stepped in to organise an all-weather card at Dundalk next Monday.

In Britain today’s classic trials card at Newbury has been switched at the last minute to Chelmsford’s all-weather surface.

These cancellations round off a week which saw Tramore fail to race last Sunday and Monday, while Tipperary was forced to cancel its Tuesday slot. Horse Racing Ireland has scheduled two new Tramore dates, and a new Tipperary meeting.

Tomorrow’s flat card at Navan has an eighth race, a listed contest transferred from Cork, and an additional race has been scheduled for Tipperary next Thursday and Gowran Park next Sunday week.

Jason Morris, HRI’s director of racing, said: “Rescheduling is always a challenge and more so at this time of the year when there is already a fairly full racing schedule, leaving fewer available alternative dates for any cancelled meetings to be transferred into.

FLEXIBLE

“HRI always tries to be flexible as demonstrated this week, switching the Heritage from Cork to Navan to preserve its position in our overall blacktype programme; creating an additional card at Dundalk next Monday to provide flat opportunities on a faster surface, given the very soft ground currently prevailing on turf everywhere; and adding some extra races to seven-race cards to address any specific gaps in the programme where races have been lost.”

Michael Grassick, chief executive of the Irish Racehorse Trainers’ Association, thanked HRI for its efforts to keep racing on. “Small things like adding a five-furlong race for older horses at Tipperary next Thursday is important as not many tracks can stage races at that distance,” he said.

Acknowledging that the weather has had a financial impact on all who make their living from the sport, Grassick said: “There’s not a lot that can be done except invest more in racecourse drainage. Racecourses in the south have been particularly badly hit in recent months. In the meantime perhaps Naas could take two more winter meetings – they have extra ground.”

Waterlogging forced Newbury to cancel its two-day Greenham fixture and fresh declarations were made at 3.30pm for the switch to Chelmsford.

Channel 4 will show the same four races as planned to accompany coverage of the Scottish National meeting from Ayr.

Sunday’s jumps meeting at Stratford must pass a 7.30am precautionary inspection today.

Today’s Maralin point-to-point is very likely to go ahead having passed an inspection yesterday and there are four points due to take place on Sunday.

The forecast is for a mainly dry week ahead, though colder than usual for the time of year.

The south-east could see rain moving in next Wednesday and Thursday.

REPLACEMENT MEETINGS