THE Shape of Water grabbed plenty of the action at last Sunday’s Oscars ceremony, while the shape of water – often that of a snowflake or an ice crystal – has been a matter of no small significance in the racing world in the last week or two also.

The “Beast from the East” laid waste to the racing programme and may well have a delayed effect on the state of the surface at next week’s Cheltenham Festival, as the moisture locked up in snowdrifts thaws and threatens to render the ground quite a bit softer than usual.