UK racing hit by cold snap

Racing in the UK has fallen victim to the cold snap with Wednesday's meetings at Leicester and Ludlow and Thursday's at Towcester abandoned due to frozen tracks.

Leicester was the first to go after clerk of the course Jimmy Stevenson inspected the track at 8am but and was left with little choice but to call off the card.

He said: "We have abandoned. We were only expecting minus 2C overnight but it got down to minus 6.4C. The predicted high for today is 4C or possibly 5C but not until about 2pm, which gives us no chance."

Ludlow also fell victim to a frozen course. Officials were due to inspect the track at 8am but after temperatures dropped to minus 4C overnight, they decided to take an earlier look.

Clerk of the course Bob Davies said: "The temperature had dropped to freezing by teatime and went down to minus 4C and we were still at that temperature at 6am."

Clerk of the course at Towcester, Robert Bellamy also as made an early decision to call off Thursday's fixture as there was little chance of the track being fit for racing.

He said: "We were raceable yesterday but the temperature dropped lower than expected overnight and it's currently minus 2C.

"We have a wind chill of minus 4C today and then the temperature is forecast to fall to minus 3C overnight with a wind chill of minus 9C.

"Tomorrow is forecast to be minus 1C with a wind chill of minus 4C so there's no chance of us being fit to race."

However there was good news elsewhere as the track at Newcastle passed an inspection, giving that meeting the green light.