William Hill Challenge Series: "You can tell how much it means to trainers, stable staff and even the jockeys" The William Hill Challenge Series returns at Punchestown today for their first Jumps meeting of the season and the operator is hoping that last year’s popularity will translate into strong participation from small yards once again. William Hill representative Alex Dunn joined journalist Johnny Ward and jockey coach Paddy flood to outline the changes being introduced for this year’s contest. Valuable to small yards Ward spoke about the state of racing and and William Hill’s continued support for racing, most notably in Ireland: He said: “At the moment we have a government that likes racing, and I do hope that continues. “William Hill also likes racing, and I’ve said this before - not because William Hill is a sponsor, but because I’ve felt that bookmakers are losing interest in horse racing. “If horse racing ceased to exist, I’m not sure the share price would actually be impacted at all, for example. And William Hill has made an effort with racing, particularly with Irish racing.” Ward highlighted how much the series means to connections: “The William Hill series starts on Tuesday. I was doing a lot of the meetings last year in which the William Hill series was a factor, and you could just tell, particularly to trainers like Philip Rothwell and stable staff, how much it meant to them, even the jockeys as well,” he said. Dunn added: “It proved last year that if you put initiatives in place that are popular, they will be back, trainers will send horses and you’ll get jockeys turning up.” Key change for this year’s series Dunn explained the key change for this year’s series, a bigger reward for winners: “The slight tweaks that you alluded to there is purely the fact that we are now rewarding winners a little bit more. “So if you finish first in a race this year, you’ll get 20 points, second is six points, third is three points, fourth is two points, and fifth is one point.” Dunn also confirmed the scale of tomorrow’s action: “The money challenge is getting underway on Tuesday. “Seven of the eight races tomorrow are challenge races, and it runs all the way through until April, with those races dotted around plenty of different tracks as well.” Both pundits stressed why these grass roots initiatives matter for the sport more broadly. Ward explained: “Turnover is basically what’s keeping the show on the road now. We need turnover on races, we need more runners, and that’s going to be very interesting going forward.” Watch the Irish Angle in full
