Jockeys, trainers and ground staff during a course inspection after race one at Chester

A delegation inspects the Chester ground on day two

Timeform: Chester ground inaccurate again at Boodles May Festival

Horse Racing

Sat May 09, 2026 · 5d ago

It's been a testing week for Chester officials but at the very least they could get the going description correct, says Timeform's David Johnson.

For the second year in a row, the going at Chester's Boodles May Festival has proven a much bigger talking point than it should have done.

Last year, Timeform used time analysis to show that the going was more testing than it was described, while this year race times showed that the opposite was true, and it was a lot quicker than described.

On both occasions, the official going was given as ‘Good’.

The 2025 Dee Stakes was won by Mount Kilimanjaro in a time of 2m12.89 seconds, yet Constitution River won the same contest this year in a race record time of 2m6.54 seconds - after the card had already been delayed for more than an hour due to unsafe ground after horses were reported to have slipped during the first race.

Now that's more than six seconds faster, which is the equivalent of more than 35 lengths on ground that was officially ‘Good’ on both occasions.

Even accounting for the fact that the winner of the Dee Stakes this year, in earning a Timeform rating of 124p, is well above average for the race, it just isn't credible that he could do that on merely ‘Good’ ground, especially as dolling out meant he was actually covering nine yards further than the winner the previous year.

A delegation of officials, jockeys and trainers on the track at Chester

Chester was delayed by more than an hour on Thursday due to the ground

On both the Wednesday and Thursday of this year's meeting, Timeform called the ground ‘Good to Firm’, and on Thursday, conditions were bordering on ‘Firm’.

Timeform stated last year that during multi-day meetings, the BHA should be providing data around time analysis to clerks to help them make objective decisions on watering, not only for the safety of horses and riders but so punters can have confidence that they can make informed betting decisions based on accurate information.

Now in instances where race times suggest a going description is inaccurate, the BHA should be logging it and providing feedback to the courses for an explanation.

While racing continues to make progress with the data it does provide to customers, clearly there is still more that could and should be done.

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