SANDOWN RACECOURSE REVIEW

SATURDAY 4th JULY 2015
CORAL ECLIPSE DAY
GRANDSTAND ENCLOSURE (tatts)
ENTRANCE £28
RACECARD £5
VISITED WITH WIFE
The racecourse itself is well signposted from the M25, but the signs for the parking aren't quite as good. There's a car park just past the entrance to the enclosures which is in Portsmouth Road that charges you £6 to park, but if you follow the signs to the free car park that is situated in More Lane, it takes you the whole way around the course and through a residential area (about 1 ½ miles distance) to get to the entrance, but if you have a sat nav you could put the address in as More Lane and it would send you a different way though the town centre to get to the car park. The only drawback if you use this car park is if you have to collect pre-booked tickets it can be long winded, as you first have to go to ticket collection point by the entrance on this side of the course so that they can check that your name is on the list. Then you have to cross the course going through the tatts enclosure and exit the course, before going to the ticket collection point at the main gate where you collect your tickets, before going back onto the course through a different gate. Due to terrible holdups on the M25 and the volume of traffic through the town centre we didn't arrive at the course until the horses were on the way to the start for the first race. So we watched the first race from the car park, which wasn't as bad as you would think, you have a good view of the whole course from here and get close to the action as the horses pass by the rails where you stand, you can also see the large screen so you didn't miss any of the action at all. I could also get internet coverage on my phone so it was possible to put a bet on from here as well. There were people who just stayed this side of the course for the whole meeting, as well as what I've just mentioned you can also get close to the action for the 5 furlong sprints as the course for these is through the centre of the course, and also go to the start if you wished. Most of the people who stayed in there took a picnic with them so they could enjoy some food and drink and have a good day at the races without it costing them anything at all.
On the betting front at Sandown there was plenty of choice in the betting ring with 48 bookies with pitches in tatts on the day but over half of them had a £5 minimum stake 28 in total, with most of these having a £5 EW minimum only 9 of them would accept £2.50 EW, of the others 19 had a £2 minimum bet with their EW terms being, 11 having a £2 EW minimum and 8 £1 EW and there was the one sole bookie accepting £1 bets or £1 EW. I know this is one of the major meetings of the year, but with no silver ring at Sandown you would expect more bookies to offer a lower minimum stake. There are a couple of things I did notice, a lot of the bookies did offer reduced EW terms so make sure you check what terms are being offered if your backing EW, and if you were a small stakes punter the bookie who did have the £1 minimum was taking advantage of this on quite a few occasions offering lower prices on the whole. So if you wanted to bet with lower stakes you may be better using the on course betting shop, using your phone to place a bet or putting your bets on before you get to the track. There were plenty of tote windows around the course in different places and on the whole there wasn't too much of a queue for them. The internet coverage at Sandown was decent and I didn't have any trouble placing a bet on my phone or checking out any of the websites or apps such as OLBG's or oddschecker etc. Yet again the OLBG members were on form by picking out 3 winners from the 7 races with their most tipped horses. The on course betting shops at Sandown are run by Betfred and Coral these were well staffed but like a lot of courses there isn't much room to write out your bet by the papers.
The facilities at Sandown on the whole are first class as you would expect from one of the country's leading tracks with plenty of choice for places to eat and drink. I did notice that they were offering a text your drink service where you could order your drinks by text then just pick them up without the queueing (I didn't try this service so I don't know if it worked, but it does sound like a good idea). The one big thing I did like here was that you could get real ale not only from one bar but they had two different bars selling it, one looked permanent while the other was only a tent. There were plenty of different bars around the enclosure but most did have big queues at them. There was also a good range of different food available from the food court from burgers and fish and chips to a self-service style café where you could sit down and enjoy a more relaxing bite to eat inside the grandstand. There was also plenty of catering facilities around other parts of the course as well offering a variety of different dishes. The one major drawback at Sandown are the toilet facilities as whichever set you went to you faced massive queues.
You have a good view of the whole course at Sandown from the grandstand but unless you use binoculars around the far turn you have to rely on the big screen, this also applies to the first few furlongs of the 5 furlong course which is a separate track through the centre of the course. The grandstand here is set up with standing at the bottom of the stand and seating towards the top, with both parts offering good views. The only problem I did notice was that in the seating part they don't allow standing for obvious reasons, however, one of the stewards didn't move people standing in front of the people in one part of the seating section which almost caused a fight and it took a couple of stewards from a different part of the stand to come and sort it out. The seating is unreserved so there is usually somewhere for you to sit down if you want as there was a mixture of people who used them, some set themselves up for the day there and others just used them for the odd race then moved on to another part of the course to watch the next race. Another positive was that they also let you take drinks to the seats if you wished where as you find some courses won't let you take drinks into the stand. The other options for watching the racing was the paddock where they had a big screen and inside the grandstand where they also had plenty of screens around the concourse. The other place you could watch the racing from, was the area in front of the bookies by the rails but from here you had to rely on the big screen unless you were standing on the rails as the gradient of the slope toward the rails isn't that steep so you have trouble seeing the track itself. From tatts you get a good view of the paddock which is situated just behind the grandstand, you can either view it from ground level or there's also a good viewing balcony at the rear of the grandstand that looks out over the paddock giving you a great view of the parade ring.
The course itself at Sandown is a right handed oval that is 1 mile 5 furlongs in distance with the home straight being 4 furlongs in length and is a constant uphill climb from the home turn into the winning post. There is also a 5 furlong course that runs through the centre of the course that is uphill all the way. Sandown is a course that suits a galloping style of horse with an emphasis on stamina due the uphill finish. People seem to think that there is a big draw bias on the 5 furlong course towards those horses that are drawn low but I only think that this applies when the going is soft. The 7 furlong races are run around the bend at Sandown and the low numbers are on the inside of the track this gives an advantage to those horses that are drawn low, but there doesn't seem to be so much of a draw bias for the longer race. In terms of pace, the track doesn't seem to suit front runners due to the uphill finish on both courses.
On the whole Sandown is a great course to visit with good views of the racing and facilities to match, the main drawbacks being the traffic getting to the course if you're visiting by car (but there is a train station within walking distance), and if you are a small stakes punter the lack of choice of on-course bookies.