Wetherby again forced to abandon

Lingfield and Wetherby, the two National Hunt fixtures scheduled for today, have both been abandoned.

Wetherby's bad luck continued hot on the heels of losing their two-day Christmas fixture.

Clerk of the course Jonjo Sanderson said yesterday: "We've lost another meeting I'm afraid. It was minus four last night and is predicted to get to plus one at best today.

"It is due to be even colder tonight, maybe minus six or seven and the frost is now embedded in the ground.

"Nothing changed yesterday so I don't expect it to today. Let's hope it gets warmer before our next fixture on January 16."

Following a 7.30am inspection Lingfield's clerk Neil MacKenzie Ross said: "We've abandoned. We've had a couple of really hard frosts in a row now.

"The temperature is only supposed to get to plus two today and it reached plus four yesterday and the frost still didn't come out of the ground.

"We are forecast minus four tonight and only plus one tomorrow so the decision was pretty easy really."

Tomorrow's meeting at Taunton has also been abandoned because the course is frozen.

With sub-zero temperatures forecast for the next couple of nights, course officials saw no reason in putting off their decision any longer.

"We can't see any point in delaying the decision. It is unraceable today in bright sunshine and it was minus 2.7 overnight," said clerk of the course Michael Trickey yesterday.

"The predictions are for minus five and six for tonight and tomorrow night.

"We thought that to save everyone the anguish of unnecessary inconvenience it would be sensible to call off the card."

Leicester's meeting tomorrow will need to pass an 8am inspection today but that looks unlikely.

Clerk of the course Jimmy Stevenson said: "It got down to minus five again last night and it's not getting very high today."

Prospects of any turf racing on Wednesday look bleak as inspections at Hexham and Southwell have already been planned for 7.30am and 12pm respectively today and Ludlow's meeting on Thursday is subject to a check at 2pm tomorrow.