the victor chandler continues to bug me.

​I often wonder how many of the staff at the B.H.A. read the Racing Post. Does Julie Harrington have the paper delivered to her home or does she subscribe on-line? Perhaps the industry newspaper awaits her on her desk at B.H.A. headquarters? You see, and I dare say I am being unfair, but I am continually made uneasy by some (or most) of the decisions to come from Portman Square – it is as if the administration of the sport is regarded by the sport’s overlords and protectors as merely a logistical exercise, a moving about of all the pieces from 9 to 5, followed by a dash to the exit and back into a world they are better at ease with.
The horse-racing industry is a complicated, nuanced sport; it cannot be learned scholastically or from hearsay. To oversee and administer the sport, a depth of knowledge would be needed, don’t you agree?
Ascot could not race on the Saturday and I have no quibble with the meeting being called-off. But could they have raced on the Sunday? And would Willie Mullins have sent El Fabiola across the Irish Sea if the conditions of the race stated, that if at all possible, the meeting would be staged on the Sunday if the weather intervened on the Saturday? The other alternative, with Lingfield almost certain to go ahead, why couldn’t the race have been slotted into the final day of the Winter Millions meeting?
The point is this: it is accepted opinion that National Hunt is being diminished due to a general lack of competitiveness and in particular the top horses being kept apart until the Cheltenham Festival. The Victor Chandler was a race to look forward to with much anticipation. A mouth-watering clash was promised between the top 2-mile chaser in Ireland and the top 2-mile chaser in Britain. 
Willie Mullins had already announced that if the race was held-over for a week and prize-money reduced, as so often happens when a race is rescheduled, that he would keep El Fabiola for the Dublin Racing Festival. It was not an ultimatum or an exercise in arm-twisting. Mullins was planning what was in the best interests of the horse and its owners.
Although the rearranged race is not quite the penalty kick for Jonbon it might have been if El Fabiola had skipped the race if run at Ascot last Saturday, he will be long-odds and we will learn nothing that we don’t know already. 
The sport, and Premierisation if it is be a success, especially through the winter months, needs clashes that excite the punter, the media and the spectator. El Fabiola versus Jonbon was such a race and because of a lack of foresight from the B.H.A. and, perhaps, a stick-in-the-mud attitude by sponsors, the race we were looking forward to is lost, replaced by a substitute affair that does not spark the imagination.
Is it asking too much, especially through the winter months, to have it stated in the conditions of major races (and meetings as a whole) that if the weather causes abandonment on the Saturday, if possible, the meeting will be staged the following day? Yes, Ascot and Lingfield staging meetings on the same day is far from convenient and ordinarily I would be critical of two local racecourses having meetings on the same day but better a little inconvenience than having potentially the most exciting race of the season thus far ripped from our grasp.
Lingfield was fit to race. Ascot is situated in close proximity. Couldn’t the groundstaff have taken the covers off the course and allowed the rising temperatures to have done its work? If Ireland can reschedule within days of an abandonment, why can it not be done in Britain? Why can’t the B.H.A. think-ahead and put into place alternative venues for the major races if the weather should spoil our fun? 
The Cheltenham Festival can only be staged at Cheltenham. The Grand National can only be run at Aintree. And though races like the Victor Chandler should be run at the course where it is traditionally held, where is the harm in having a potential relocation in the conditions of the race in case Mother Natures takes command of the situation?