Newmarket expecting two bands of rain to hit the track before and after racing on Friday

Rain is forecast for Newmarket on Friday but it may not prove to be enough, or to arrive in time, for those hoping for softer conditions on the second day of the July festival.

Connections of Via Sistina, the favourite for the Group 1 Tattersalls Falmouth Stakes after her victory in the Pretty Polly Stakes in Ireland last time out, have been waiting for rain to fall at the July course to commit the five-year-old to the race.

However, the ground remained good to firm, good in places on Thursday after 0.5mm of rain overnight, while the time for the Princess of Wales’s Stakes was only 0.07 seconds outside the course record.

Two bands of rain are set to cross Newmarket on Friday, with the heaviest showers expected towards the end of the afternoon and after the Falmouth Stakes has been run at 3.35pm.

Michael Prosser, clerk of the course and director of racing at Newmarket, said: "I called the meteorologists mid-afternoon and they hadn’t changed their forecast, which is to say there’s rain forecast to come in that’s not particularly heavy between 9am and lunchtime. That should amount to between 2-4mm. 

"Then there’s an interlude and somewhere around 4.30pm there is more organised rain of 2-5mm until the evening. 

"It’s forecast to be dry overnight into Saturday, although from 7am onwards there are due to be showers but it will be windy. I think where we are on Friday is where we'll be on Saturday as the wind is likely to counteract any rain that arrives."

Prosser added that watering would take place on the first furlong of the 1m6f course overnight on Thursday as it had not been irrigated with the rest of the track.

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