THE BEST LITTLE NATIONAL OF THEM ALL.

​On Saturday week, the day after the final day of the Cheltenham Festival, arguably the most important and competitive of the British regional Nationals is run at Uttoxeter, the Midlands National, the trophy for which is possibly the most impressive presented to a winning owner in the entire calendar, with the possible exception of the Foxhunter’s trophy at the Festival which is so large no single jockey can life it above shoulder height.
There is an element of ‘after the Lord’s Mayor Show’ about the Midlands National coming as it does the day after the greatest show on Earth. As anyone who has read my thoughts in other pieces on this website will be fully aware by now, ( I do go on about it, it must be admitted) I am a vociferous advocate of a fifth day at the Cheltenham Festival. Not an extra Festival Day but more of a ‘Heath meeting’, as was once the case on the Saturday after Royal Ascot, to allow the Cheltenham executive plenty of wriggle room if any of the four days should be lost to the weather. I simply think it a sensible insurance policy, especially as it gives Cheltenham space to run races that might in time become part of the Festival itself.
But if this perfectly feasible suggestion were to be taken up, it would, even as a ‘Heath meeting’, overshadow the Midlands National. I.T.V., obviously, would not up-sticks, as they do now, and present their Saturday programme from Uttoxeter but remain at Cheltenham. As it is, much of the talk on the Saturday revolves around reviewing the past week’s racing. To my mind, Uttoxeter and the Midlands National deserve more than second consideration.
I would like to see Uttoxeter swap places in the calendar with Wolverhampton, with the Midlands National run on the same day as Sandown’s Imperial Cup and the pointless and unnecessary ‘Lincoln Trial’ meeting transferred to the Saturday after Cheltenham. To muse for a moment on the ‘Lincoln Trial. The actual Lincoln, which I propose would give the start of the flat season greater significance and interest if it went back in time to be a forty-runner race started from a barrier, is run on turf over a straight mile. Wolverhampton is an all-weather surface without anything like a straight mile. Surely this race, if it is at all necessary, should be staged at Newcastle where there is a straight mile?
There is further merit in staging the Midlands National a week earlier as it would allow any horse due to run at Aintree a longer period to recover from its exertions, perhaps making the race a better proposition to trainers. I would also suggest, given we are about to enter the heartland of the jumping season, that Sandown and the Imperial Cup and Uttoxeter and the Midlands National make for a better menu than an only slighter better than average card from Wolverhampton and Sandown.
It might be, of course, that Uttoxeter prefer their present date in the calendar. How many racegoers from Ireland go on from Cheltenham to Uttoxeter I can only hazard a guess at? But if Uttoxeter were to join forces with Stratford and Warwick, both courses having meetings on the Sunday and Monday prior to the Festival, a joint marketing strategy might be agreed upon in an attempt to persuade the early-bird Festival-goers from over the Irish Sea to try their luck at all three meetings before beginning their betting spree at Cheltenham? This triumvirate of courses could market the three days as either ‘The Midlands Festival’ or perhaps ‘The Little Festival’. Just a thought.
Uttoxeter, by the way, is one of the most under-rated racecourses in this country. It was transformed back in the day from decay and uncertainty by Sir Stanley Clarke of Lord Gyllene and Grand National fame. The first building renovated at the course was not the grandstand or the weighing room, I believe, but the public toilets. I remember him saying that ‘you should never be embarrassed by the state of your toilets’. If only such a philosophy could be adopted by every public venue.