Some good points have been bought up regarding this.
First is juveniles.
Do you want this as 3yos or 4yos? Reason is the races are 3yo from Oct to Dec but 4yo from Jan to May. This creates a scenario where a 4yo saved towards the end of their 4yo season when essentially they are not a juvenile are open to race if the 4yo option is selected. Personally 3yo's would be far easier to manage CK wise. With TOM it is just as easy to manage one or the other. Also the distance of these races was queried. As nearly all juvenile races are of 16-17f it makes sense to have all races at this distance. What is everyone's thoughts on this?
Second are the NH Flat races
Came to my attention that horses that have raced in a hurdle, flat or chase race are ineligible for NH flat races. I can add this into the restrictions easily enough. Next question will be age limits (are they 4yo+). Also how many of these races per week? I am thinking one per week here as festivals like Cheltenham and Aintree have one or two bumpers at most.
Third is the age for open races.
If you go with juveniles at 3 then it would make sense to make all other races 4yo+. Maybe some can be made 5yo+ but the majority would be best leaving at +1 the juvenile age or higher.
Fourth are the handicaps
Some big races, particularly the biggest of them all, the Grand National, are handicaps. They are also graded handicaps. Do we leave them as grade 3's or do we make them handicaps?
Another is was novices but being the first season this is not going to be an issue until next season and I guess we cross that bridge when we come to it.
I am finalizing a revised schedule for people to look at. It has bumpers and juveniles included along with revised weekly schedules. You wont notice much in the first 11 weeks. Simply the addition of NH flat races. From week 12 though big differences. First off week 12 is Cheltenham. 25 races has been set down for this week. In week 13 all the races are at Fairyhouse for the Irish Grand National. Week 14 its off the Aintree for the English Grand National. Week 15 has a few races at Sandown but the bulk of the card is at Ayr for the Scottish Grand National. Week 16 sees all the races at Punchestown. Week 17 is down as Chepstow but that is to be finalized.
For those that said there were no Irish races, there are actually 59 of them. More than enough to keep any Irishman happy.
