THOUSANDS OF Irish visitors to Cheltenham found themselves in the unusual position of having nothing to do yesterday when it was announced at 8.30am that day two of the festival had been abandoned.
The six-race card was cancelled because of high winds of more than 50mph which threatened to take the roof off the tented village which houses hospitality tents and shops.
The talk show on the local radio station was questioning the decision, with disgruntled callers saying it was looking after "the prawn sandwich brigade" instead of thinking about the punters in the stands.
This theory was rejected by racecourse managing director Edward Gillespie. "At 50 miles an hour we could not invite people on to this site because we could not guarantee their safety."
He said even if the tented village was closed off, debris could have been blown on to the racecourse or around the grounds and cause injury.
An advisory group, including emergency services and racecourse staff, met at 8am "and the advice, to a man, was that we could not open the gates at 10.30".
Yesterday's ticket holders will receive a full refund. The six races will be run today and tomorrow, and today's capacity has been increased by 10,000 to 65,000. Mr Gillespie said he could not estimate the cost of abandoning the day's races.
However, television racing pundit John McCririck told The Irish Times that the bookmakers' turnover would be badly hit as punters would never place as many bets in two days as they would have had in three.
Mr Gillespie said the racecourse was lucky that the winds came early enough in the week to allow the races to be accommodated in the final days of the festival.
In 1978 the Gold Cup was held a month later than planned after Prestbury Park was snowed in, with up to eight inches of snow in places.
John Francome rode Midnight Court to victory when the race was rescheduled for April 15th.
