i admire the work of david jennings ....

​I have stopped mourning the loss of Steve Dennis and Alastair Down and have become accustomed to Richard Forristal and David Jennings and to admire their wit, wisdom and professional excellence. Rarely do I disagree with anything they write. That was until David Jennings’ last column.
Now, whether he read my last piece when I advocated two possible team competitions might be added to the flat programme and thought he could improve upon my suggestions we shall never know. Perhaps I am flattering myself that a professional journalist of the calibre of David Jennings would even visit my site, let alone use it for inspiration. But a few days after my posting here he was going public with an idea of his own regarding team events.
I suggested female jockeys versus male jockeys and northern trainers versus southern trainers. Fun events with a streak of edginess. David Jennings suggested a Ryder Cup event for racing.
I blame Bernie Eccleston for ruining the jockeys championship for giving forth his wisdom on how racing could be made as exiting as Formula 1. He had shares in a horse, attended a race-meeting and suddenly people in racing were taking notice of him. That was horse racing imitating motor racing.
Then there is the Racing League, another ill-considered innovation borrowed from motor racing. City Street Racing a dangerous imitation of bike racing on city streets.
Nobody, it seems, including Racing Post journalists, has any faith in horse racing pure and simple, a sport with a rich history recorded for over 200-years. In the past when the sport has innovated, as with starting stalls, patrol cameras, body protectors for jockeys etc, the effects have always been positive and generally regarded as great improvements. It seems to me that racing journalists have run out of ideas and are now resulting to other sports to fuel their imagination.
The Jennings great idea is an Irish jockey versus British, one on the flat, one over jumps. A Ryder Cup for horse racing, a sport that has got on splendidly for over 200-years without ever being considered, outside of owner, trainer, jockey, stable staff, a team sport. 
The first stick I have to beat Jennings with is this, the Ryder Cup is not contested by Ireland and Britain but the U.S. and Europe. So, it fails on that score if on nothing else. My second stick to beat him with is the proposition that the age-old rivalry between the two nations is reason enough to adopt his idea. The rivalry only exists at the Cheltenham Festival. It does not exist outside of Cheltenham. It does not exist at Royal Ascot, Goodwood, Aintree or any of the other racing festivals. British spectators enjoy an Irish success as much as the Irish on British racecourses, as I suspect the Irish have no bitterness towards a British raider scooping one of their big prizes.
There is no if or maybe about Pat Smullen being deserving of an annual racing event to memorialise his name and achievements but don’t make it something as speculative as a phoney-baloney ‘such fun’ event like an Ireland v Britain team jockeys challenge.
If you were to take a non-racing friend to one of these team events, how can you sell the sport to him or her when their first exposure is something that is only an imitation of the real thing? And that’s my problem with every innovation proposed. Royal Ascot is an imitation of horse racing. It works because it has a history that is laced into the history of the country. You couldn’t have a northern version of Royal Ascot. Or an Irish version. It is unique, an organically perpetuating slice of British cultural life.
To grow this sport, to maintain what we have and to expand its popularity and licence with the public, the imperative has to be to look after the existing spectators so that they have a product they can invite their friends and colleagues to a day at the races. The whip debate must be concluded as the whip is what keeps a great many people away from our sport. We have lost that battle; educating the public is a lost cause. The innovation that would work best in my opinion is for the sport in this country to adopt the Irish tradition of festivals at the country racecourses. 
Yes, we have racing festivals all summer long in Britain but they are in the main at the top echelon. It seems all of Ireland’s country courses stage festivals, with Listowel’s Harvest Festival the next on the menu. When summer jumping commenced, with foresight it could have been linked to the festival concept. Newton Abbot, Cartmel, Worcester, Market Rasen, could all have followed Perth’s example. Link festivals with local events, have a free entry day, bus locals to the track, have talks by racing celebrities in the nearby towns. Take the sport to the people, address their concerns, put on display all the noble and charitable work done by racing people and the sport. Let’s have an English Galway. Not 7-days, though. You have to have the constitution of an Irishman for 7-days and we Brits don’t have the backbone for it.