The Cheltenham Festival Trials Day took place over the weekend, and it was an incredibly dramatic day of racing.

Spare a thought for connections of Sir Gino, favourite for the Champion Hurdle, who pulled up with injury, and there’s a chance he may never race again. The prognosis since has been more positive than I expected, but there are still plenty of questions to answer.

Of course, that’s not one of the blunders made by the course. They both came in the closing race, which, to be honest, turned into a complete farce.

The Cheltenham Festival is six weeks away, and it’s a four-day event where the eyes of the sporting world are on horse racing. We need to impress, and in the final race at Cheltenham before the big meeting, it was far from impressive.

Drain Issues Cause a Hole in the Cheltenham Track

The final race of the day on Saturday was delayed due to an issue on the track initially. The problem was that a huge hole was found, which was apparently caused by a drainage pipe.

Pictures of someone from the course sticking their hand down the hold, to the extent where their full arm was inside the hole, must have been very worrying for those connections who had horses in the race.

Nicky Henderson took it the furthest by withdrawing his runner from the race.

Had the hole not been discovered, and a horse had put their foot into it, I dread to think what that would have caused, for both horse and jockey.

After some time, the hole was repaired, those inspecting the track, including jockeys and trainers, were satisfied with the repairs, and the race was then allowed to take place.

This brings us to the second issue, which arose from the delays in getting this race off the ground.

Final Race Photo in the Dark

Just when Cheltenham wanted the last race to go by without trouble, so they could declare a winner and focus on getting home, the race saw a closely fought-out finish, which resulted in a photo finish.

Usually, there’s no problem with a photo finish. The judge looks at an image, and a winner is declared.

These images are not the best at any time. It’s one of my biggest gripes with racing, the lack of technology used in the sport. However, the image we saw from this race took things to a whole new level.

📸 Here is the photo-finish between Kripticjim and Taurus Bay for the final race at Cheltenham after a lengthy delay due to a hole in the ground https://t.co/9PzIkSBQ33 pic.twitter.com/wV0THbWUID

— Racing Post (@RacingPost) January 24, 2026

As you can see from the tweet above, the image shows a dark racecourse, and picking out the winner is simply impossible to do from the image.

A winner was called, officially the race was won by Kripticjim, by a short head. However, there is no way that anyone can call that horse the winner, using only the image given for the photo.

Firstly, this race shouldn’t have been run in the conditions that were there at the time. The darkness was coming in quickly.

Secondly, let’s just say it was fine for the race to run. We should now be in a position where technology allows us to capture better photos.

The darkness on the image was enhanced by the lack of technology in use. Surely we can do better than this. A still from TV images, which showed things in a much better light, was used to determine the winner. Had it been closer, I’d have no idea what would have happened.

Added Focus on Getting the Festival Right

All the drama that has happened at Trials Day has put more focus on the biggest meeting of the year.

We want an error-free meeting that showcases the best of our sport in a safe and competitive environment. But if we do have any problems, then there’s going to be more talk about them, coming just weeks after the incidents at the weekend.

Cheltenham is the top of the mountain for jumps racing. We should not be finding large holes in the course, in between racing. We should also not be racing in the dark.

The best week of the year has just found itself with a bit of added pressure.