No one, not even a born cynic and conspiracy theorist follower as I am prone to be, can deny that the weather in Britain and Ireland has not changed, perhaps for the better, over the past decade. Winters are less wintery, which can only be a good thing, and summers are becoming more Caribbean-like, which for me is less good. I believe this change in our weather pattern to be due to natural phenomenon, not human activity. At the moment El Nino is not playing nicely as it likes to bat the jet-stream this way and that, causing air currents to be where they are not naturally suppossed to be. Also, and this is never mentioned by advocates of climate catastrophe is the manipulation of the weather by scientists of several countries since the 1940's must also have played in part in buggering-up the world's weather.
But let's not play politics and concentrate on what climate change means to the sport, and the potential advantages it might bring. Not every summer in Britain will be like the last summer and who knows, the next decade might flip the weather on its head and return to Britain and Ireland the sustained downpours we are used to. The main advantage I see to drier, warmer summers and autumn is that the flat turf season could be extended all the way to Christmas. Bath, for instance, has no irrigation system, so it may benefit from have fewer summer fixtures and having fixtures in October, November and December. I am sure there are other racecourses that have ground conditions that would allow them to race beyond the present closure of the season. If this proposal were to be viable, in periods of summer drought this would save water and would tick boxes with government and the Net Zero nutters.
Given the flat often starts with soft and heavy ground conditions, if the flat were to be extended by six-weeks or so, the new turf season could be delayed for two or three weeks to allow for drier conditions, with the Guineas pushed back similarly, along with the Derby meeting and Royal Ascot. As in France, though I would not be tolerant of racecourse closures, racecourses could become assigned fixtures more befitting general weather patterns and underfoot ground conditions. The benefit here would be that by assigning Bath, for example, and other courses, to fixtures at the back end of the season, in my brave new world that would be into December, there would be less racing in the summer months, which everyone is crying out for. I might even suggest a certain amount of centralisation might be necessary, with racing migrating north if, as it has been this summer, racecourses in the North of England and Scotland can provide naturally good ground.
What also should happen due to climate change is that those racecourses that race on the flat and over jumps, Ascot, Newbury, Sandown etc, should be obliged to water their jumps courses and not allow them to turn brown and hard, as happens every summer in which we suffer drought conditions, which might nessitate larger reservoirs. Although the B.H.A. tries to be flexible, moving fixtures at short notice when it is called-for, they are hamstrung by the wants, needs and tantrums of all of its component parts. None of us know what the future holds for our sport, especially National Hunt. While they must fight the present-day political fires, the B.H.A. and its 'stakeholders' have a duty to look to the future; if we must have the same level of fixtures, stretch those fixtures out over a longer period, maximise the strengths of every racecourse, work with the changing weather patterns, do not be bound hand and foot to tradition, as much as that grieves me to suggest. The French racing authorities are boldly investigating how their sport needs to adapt to a world of less money; attempting to protect horse racing in their country from headwinds that might only get stronger if they sit on their hands now and simply hope for the best. All my thoughts on this subject may be wide of the mark, of course. Bath might go under if they are not allowed to race during the summer months. But that does not mean that the sport cannot adapt as the French propose to do.
Horse racing in Britain have other, perhaps even more pressing problems to overcome, all of which stems from political idealism. I try to steer clear of this threat as a life without my sport would be a life I would nothing to do with. I have been privileged to have had horse racing as the ever-present facet of my life; it is the love of my life and I cannot contemplate life without it. That is the truth, as sad as it might seem to those with more varied interests in their lives. Only the people of this sport can save this sport, and that is everyone from those who work at the cliff-face to those at the very top of the pyramid. Indeed, the King himself should involve himself in our struggle, if only to honour the memory of his mother.