Storm Eunice: Fakenham, Lingfield and Southwell Friday meetings abandoned as strong winds hit Britain
A red 'dangerous' weather warning has been issued as the UK faces gusts up to 90mph from Storm Eunice; Lingfield, Southwell and Fakenham's meetings on Friday abandoned; Kelso goes ahead as only UK fixture; Haydock set for Saturday inspection
Friday 18 February 2022 10:36, UK
Lingfield, Fakenham and Southwell's Friday race meetings have been abandoned due to high winds caused by Storm Eunice.
Weather warnings are in place across most of the UK - including rare red warnings for wind, with extremely strong gusts expected to develop in the South West of England throughout Friday morning, which will spread north and east.
It is expected to cause more widespread damage than Storm Dudley, which blew its way through on Wednesday night.
Fakenham was called off on Thursday due to the extreme nature of the weather warnings, while Lingfield and Southwell both failed a Friday morning inspection.
Kelso, in Scotland, passed its morning inspection and will be the only UK meeting to race as scheduled on Friday.
Haydock's Grand National Trial meeting on Saturday is subject to a precautionary inspection at 8am on Saturday morning, although the track is currently fit to race.
Kirkland Tellwright, clerk of the course at Haydock, is hoping the storm has abated by the time their meeting.
"The main concern has been wind, which would be a problem on a raceday but shouldn't be the day before. There will be a lot of damage to repair, no doubt," he said.
"Saturday is expected to be blustery, gusts of wind and more rain. Having walked the course a couple of times today, I'm pretty optimistic we'll get through.
"The hurdle course is heavy, soft in places, and is not in a bad place. The chase course is heavy, and very heavy in one or two places so we might be bypassing them. I've taken the second fence out in the back straight mainly as a precaution because it gives us more options in terms of how we get past that location."
