Horse Racing and most sports suspended - what are we going to do?

So, horse racing has been suspended here in the UK with no racing from Wednesday 18th March until the end of April. Who knows where we will be in the fight against Coronavirus by then, hopefully winning? A raft of measures are now in place, thousands of us working from home and non-essential foreign travel basically banned, theatres pulling down the curtain, at least for now, and trips to the pub certainly frowned upon!  

Horseracing is not the only sport to suffer of course, Football and Rugby are in the same boat with players at home rather than on training pitches. Formula One won’t be racing until May at best with McLaren and now Pirelli employees testing positive for the virus. I read today England batsman Alex Hales is in self-isolation having developed coronavirus symptoms after returning home from Pakistan and surely the start of the Cricket season will get dragged into this soon. Euro 2020 has become Euro 2021 and the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games flame handover in Athens next week will be done behind closed doors though Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has insisted the Games will go ahead as planned in July; we’ll see........

It is going to be a long few months for us sports fans, what will we watch? Talk about? Argue about? Feel elated by and get pissed off by?  

The Dubai World Cup meeting at the end of the month does go ahead (as I write) but with no spectators. A statement on the website of the Dubai Racing Club read: “Due to the ongoing global health implications of the COVID-19/coronavirus and precautionary measures being implemented by the UAE government, Dubai Racing Club will host the Dubai World Cup meeting on March 28 without paid hospitality spectators at Meydan Racecourse.”

That may well be our next chance for a bet and all being well I will of course be getting involved. As I wrote yesterday, truth be told, it doesn't really matter in a situation such as this. Sport is really nothing more than an escape for most of us, taking us away for a few excited moments from the run of the mill, day-to-day, grown-up serious stuff.

For now, stay healthy and be lucky