Turning on the taps at Epsom Downs may go against tradition, but that is a better option than putting horses at risk
The taps were turned on at Epsom Downs on Monday morning, in preparation for the two-day Derby Festival which opens with the Oaks card on Friday. The decision to apply 5mm of water to the parts of the track that are currently good-to-firm arrived 24 hours after Andrew Cooper, the clerk of the course, described the weather forecast for the next few days as “one of the ones you want to avoid” in Derby week.
Monday also marked Epsom’s debut on the excellent Weathertrax system, which gives real-time updates on the current weather and going at the course, how much water (if any) is being applied, and how much has been lost via “evapotranspiration” – directly from the soil and also from the grass – in the last 24 hours. It highlights Cooper’s problem as he aims to ensure that the going is “no faster than good-to-firm” for the Classics later this week.