Freezing weather claims jumps cards on Thursday and Friday

There will be no jumps racing on Thursday or Friday with frozen tracks claiming cards at Newbury, Doncaster and Huntingdon.

Only Ayr has staged National Hunt action so far this week and while Wednesday’s fixture at Taunton goes ahead as planned, another blank spell will end the working week.

Newbury’s clerk of the course George Hill had planned an inspection at 8.30am ahead of Thursday’s card, but was able to make a slightly earlier decision following temperatures of -3C overnight.

He said: “The forecast has unfortunately proved correct, we got down to -3C and it has been freezing since 9pm or 10pm.

“The course is frozen in places and we are forecast 1C or 2C today with the possibility of sleet or snow showers tonight and another freezing night.

“With temperature of 2C or 3C forecast tomorrow, it just won’t be enough”

It is a similar story at Doncaster, where clerk David Attwood has made an early call ahead of Friday’s meeting.

He said: “We got down to -2C and there is still some snow on the course from Sunday which prevented us from fleecing the track, along with the area of waterlogged ground on Bawtry Road, which is also frozen now.

“We are forecast -4C tonight and the same tomorrow, possibly even -5C, so we thought it best to take an early decision now.”

Huntingdon were also scheduled to race over jumps on Friday, but clerk of the course Andrew Morris admitted cancellation was fairly “inevitable” after flooding at the track earlier in the week.

He said: “A bit of an inevitable decision. A combination of the home straight flooding on Monday and though some of that flooding has receded, but there are still areas of the track that would not be safe to race on now.

“And on top of that we’ve had a frost overnight, so it is now frozen in places as well.

“The forecast for the next two days is for even colder temperatures and it is a fairly consistent forecast, so there’s really no prospect for improvement.”

Thursday’s other planned card at Catterick was called off on Tuesday.