Go Racing in Yorkshire Summer Festival in full swing
Last Friday saw the start of the 16th Go Racing in Yorkshire Summer Festival, which comprises nine days of racing – between July 19 and 27 – at York, Thirsk, Doncaster, Catterick, Beverley, Redcar, Ripon and Pontefract.
This year’s festival, sponsored by Sky Bet, has chosen the Matt Hampson Foundation – an organisation that inspires and supports young people seriously injured through sport – as its charity partner, in support of jockey Graham Lee who suffered life-changing injuries in a fall last November.
Charlotte Russell, General Manager of Go Racing in Yorkshire said: “We wanted this year’s charitable element of the Summer Festival to support Graham Lee and after speaking with him and his family, they suggested the Matt Hampson Foundation as Graham has been spending time there, as part of his rehabilitation programme.”
Speaking at the press launch of the festival at Thirsk Races last week, Joanna Mason explained how much it means to the jockeys to be supporting Graham and his family.
“Graham was the friendly face of the weighing room – always so helpful and prepared to give advice to anyone who needed it. It was never a bother to him, and I was just one of many young jockeys he helped along the way.
“I know I speak for all the jockeys when I say how much we welcome the racing community rallying round Graham and his family, and having the Go Racing in Yorkshire Festival supporting this fantastic charity is another brilliant and high-profile example.”
Alongside the traditional exit collections, the Festival is raising funds for the foundation in a variety of ways:
- The ever-popular ‘Sky Bet Paddock and Chips’ football skills event will see jockeys going into the paddock before racing to take five shots at different sized goals worth £25, £50 and £100.
- A Festival raffle will be held to win a unique prize – four shoes from Yorkshire’s 2023 Group 1 sprinters – Highfield Princes, Shaquille, Regional, and Art Power – mounted and engraved.
- Thirsk will be holding a charity race for stable staff before the main card on Friday, July 26th.
- Sky Bet will also be sponsoring a race, with Matt Hampson attending the meeting at York on July 27th, the final day of the Festival.
The Summer Festival is not the only fundraising initiative Yorkshire connections have been involved with this year. In June, Charlotte Russell took on her own challenge – as one of 12 amateur jockeys taking part in the 2024 Macmillan Ride of their Lives at York Racecourse, a once-in-a-lifetime event summed up by Charlotte as an ‘amazing experience’.
The race, won by 19-year-old eventer Louis Pern on the Richard Fahey-trained Hartswood, raised over £170,000, with an additional £360,000 donated across the weekend. Since its inception in 1971, the Macmillan Ride of their Lives has raised over £10.5 million, all of which goes to help Macmillan invest in the cancer workforce across Yorkshire.
This year has also seen the launch of the NHS Trusts Bowel Cancer Awareness Racedays, a new campaign for the Yorkshire Beacon run collectively with the nine Yorkshire racecourses.
The first event was held at Catterick Racecourse in January, which included the running of the Bowel Cancer Screening Programme Saves Lives Novices’ Hurdle won by One More Stroke. The campaign is aimed at 50-74 year olds and these hugely successful days are running at various Yorkshire racecourses for the rest of the year.
All the family-friendly fixtures for this year’s Summer Festival can be found here on our events page, along with the upcoming dates for the bowel cancer screening programme.
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