Chester's Saturday meeting passes its inspection and no problems expected at Haydock as wet weather eases off

Chester's meeting on Saturday will go ahead as planned and Haydock is not expecting any issues staging its Temple Stakes card after wet weather in the north west of Britain eased off.

Chester had called a 2pm inspection today for its seven-race card after a deluge of rain earlier in the week left areas of standing water on the track. However, despite an extra 1.5mm rainfall in the last 24 hours, the standing water has gone off the course and the going is described as soft, with the action beginning at 1.45.

Haydock's going was changed to soft, heavy in places on Thursday after 46mm of rain earlier in the week and despite some light rain at the track before it begins its two-day meeting on Friday, it is then set to remain dry until after racing tomorrow.

Speaking on Friday morning, clerk of the course Daniel Cooper said: "We've got some heavy drizzle this morning coming through until about 10 or 11am, but then it looks to be dry right through until after racing.

"It's more soft in the home straight, but there's an opportunity it might dry out very slightly, and it's come at the right time. We could've been in a worse situation and we're now very excited for some high-class racing."

Alongside the Temple Stakes, Haydock also hosts the Sandy Lane Stakes and five of its races are live on ITV3 on Saturday.

Cartmel is another course in the north west to have been on the receiving end of the incessant rain. A total of of 53mm fell in a 24-hour period from Wednesday morning and the ground was on Thursday described as soft for its opening fixture of the year on Saturday.

Thursday's meeting at Catterick survived a morning inspection, but Wednesday's fixtures at Warwick and Gowran Park were called off due to the heavy rain.

The meeting at Gowran Park has been rescheduled for June 17, with entries closing at midday on June 12 and declarations to run to be made by 10am on June 15. Full details of the programme of races for the Monday afternoon fixture will be published in due course.

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