After the running of the seventh race at the Vaal on Thursday, a severe lightning storm moved in above the Vaal racecourse. With no sign of the storm dissipating, races 8,9 and 10.
That’s from the official Stipes Report and it’s an all too familiar outcome that has clearly irked a man who has been racing forever.
Longtstanding racing man Selwyn Elk writes in the Sporting Post Mailbag that if he didn’t know better he would start believing that there are authorities in the programming department at Phumelela that are trying to sabotage the industry!
after taking an age and giving themselves accolades for starting races earlier, in their ‘wisdom’ they decided to have a 10 race programme on Thursday at the Vaal.
As often is the case this time of the year the meeting was ONCE AGAIN abandoned after the running of the 7th race.
If the last race was programmed for 14h00 the chances of meetings being abandoned would be greatly reduced.
For certain parties that think it is unrealistic to start meetings much earlier, they may not have been around when ‘breakfast’ meetings were held many years ago and they were finished by lunchtime and proved very successful.
The announcement of “we apologise for the inconvenience caused“ should be the exception instead of the rule when racing is at the Vaal at this time of the year.
