Equestrian
“
For flat racing, the surface wants to be moist enough to let the horses ‘get their toes into it’, and with a good covering of grass
Looking down on a race day, with the Trundle in the foreground
to get the best out of them. He was actually born on a stud farm in County Kildare. A spell of show jumping and three-day eventing preceded a move to England as an apprentice National Hunt jockey, a career cut short by serious injury. He was determined to stay in racing and took the course management route, starting at Catterick Bridge in Yorkshire, before moving to Epsom and switching to the Flat. Only a handful of former jockeys have made careers as Clerks or Grounds Managers. Seamus is one of them.
He is 100 percent self-taught, studying for and achieving the Diploma in Turf Management at Brinsbury College, Chichester when he first came to Goodwood. Watering has been the overriding factor
this season. He and his team had already been working very hard for weeks to get and keep moisture in the ground, and it was set to continue. “First requirement, always, is to get the
Some courses are able to use pop-ups very successfully but, because of the ups and downs, here they could never be totally successful
”
The first furlong of the afternoon for the Upton Irrigator, with Sam Cook at the helm
118 I PC AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2015
grass growing. We are fortunate at Goodwood because we can put on a fair bit of water and it will soon drain away from the surface,” he says. “The key to keeping Downland courses like this in top racing condition is to keep moisture in the ground and the grass growing. If you can achieve this, you’re halfway there. You have to avoid it getting bone dry at all costs.” “For flat racing, the surface wants to be
moist enough to let the horses ‘get their toes into it’, and with a good covering of grass.” There speaks a Clerk of the Course, who is both groundsman and horseman. The course at Goodwood, used only for
flat racing, is 700 feet above the sea and there’s always a drying breeze. Even in normal rainfall conditions, being on the chalk of the South Downs, it dries very quickly. Its quite severe undulations and series of sharp turns make it testing for horse and jockey. It’s far from easy to irrigate effectively too. When Seamus first came to Goodwood,
pop-up sprinklers were used for watering but, in his words, “they did as much good in the car parks as they did on the course.” “You absolutely must have consistency
with course irrigation. You can’t have a horse travelling at 35-40mph suddenly hitting a piece of ground that hasn’t been watered because it's been missed by a pop-up sprinkler.” “Some courses are able to use pop-ups
very successfully but, because of the ups and downs, here they could never be totally successful.” It didn’t take long for Seamus to recognise
the weakness and be instrumental in getting a changeover made in the means of irrigation delivery. Borehole irrigation at Goodwood House, the 400-year old focal point of the vast 12,500 acre Goodwood estate, feeds the racecourse’s own irrigation system. Water is pumped electronically to the Trundle Hill high spot, then gravity fed by pump to a ring
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156 |
Page 157 |
Page 158 |
Page 159 |
Page 160 |
Page 161 |
Page 162 |
Page 163 |
Page 164