A Guide To The Weekend’s Racing 19/03/2015

Fancy watching some live racing this weekend? Make sure you don’t miss a trick with our guide to the best up-coming meetings of the next three days.

Friday

Not strictly the weekend though a little flutter after a hard week’s labour can’t do any harm at all. There will be a packed five meetings in Britain and Ireland, those afternoon events ending at around 17:00 and those early evening fixtures going on right through until 21:00.

Somewhat disappointingly, it’s a day of small fields across the board as even the first day of the Newbury meeting, probably the most exciting of the day, struggles to put together seven competitive races. A 3m hurdle and a 3m chase are both followed by the feature race of the day, a class two 2m handicap hurdle. Such charges on display in this race include course and distance winner Parsnip Pete who will have to defy top weight for Tom George, Chesil Beach Boy who will have the advantage of being ridden by 7lb claimer Louis Muspratt and Cheltenham Festival non-runner Royal Guardsman.

The other Friday meetings come from Lingfield, Sedgefield and Wolverhampton and, in Ireland, Dundalk.

Saturday

There are currently six meetings taking place across Britain and Ireland this weekend, with races from as early as 13:25 to as late as 17:45. Channel 4 will be broadcasting eight races from the Newbury and Kelso meetings – that coverage starting at 13:30 and ending just after the last race at 15:45.

The second and final day of this Newbury meeting will be centred around the day’s feature race, the Silver Jubilee Handicap Chase. Open to horses aged five and older though featuring mainly stalwarts of racing, this showcase sees these trusty mounts tackle the 3m,2f Newbury trip. Former Welsh National winner Mountainous is slated to be lining up as is three-time former Cheltenham Gold Cup candidate Carruthers.

This Silver Jubilee feature will be preceded by a procession lead by this season’s Gold Cup victor Coneygree, the novice of Mark Bradstock being the half-brother of Carruthers, both sharing dam Plaid Maid. Bradstock is the trainer of both charges.

At Kelso, the centrepiece will be a 2m,5f handicap chase for novices with a number of younger animals vying for supremacy in Scotland. Charlie Mann’s Seventh Sky looked impressive when taking down Yorkist by 19 lengths at Musselburgh and is slated to appear here. Meanwhile, he may be joined by Sue Smith’s equally sound looking Straidnahanna.

Elsewhere, there will also be racing at Bangor, Fontwell and Stratford. In Ireland, there’s Gowran Park.

Sunday

There’s a small card on Sunday with just three meetings – two in Great Britain and one in Ireland. Regardless, there will still be a variety of racing on offer with all of chases, hurdles and flat racing being provided by the three racecourses.

Market Rasen will be home to three hurdles, two chases and a flat race; Wincanton’s offers four hurdles and two chases and Downpatrick will host three hurdles races, the same number over fences and a flat race.

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