This time everyone is invited to the party at the Cheltenham Festival

The time has come for racing to wrestle back control of the C-word. Twelve months ago it was all so different. A festival took place but it was a festival in name only. The story of those eerily silent four days was told against the backdrop of Covid, just as it had been one year earlier when the finest of all jumps jamborees became the hottest of hot potatoes.

Now there should be no sense of guilt or concern about attending a party to which almost all the usual guests were last year uninvited. For on the morning of Tuesday, March 15, the gates to God’s own racecourse will be flung open and thousands upon thousands of starved disciples will delight in worshipping at their favourite altar, talking not about Covid or the coronavirus but the great green glory that is Cheltenham.

Normal service is about to be resumed.