Ed Chamberlin on coronavirus shutdown, Cheltenham Festival, Royal Ascot and more 2020 reflections

Tuesday February 11th 2020.

St George’s Hall Liverpool.

On stage I said the words: “The 2020 Randox Health Grand National could be the biggest story for the sport in decades”.

I then signed to Laura White’s rendition of Imagine with the Liverpool Signing Choir and followed it up by interviewing John Lennon’s sister.

You can imagine the buzz I was feeling when I came off stage and bumped into the BHA Chief Executive Nick Rust. I said to him: “It’s so exciting to have the Cheltenham Festival and then Tiger Roll’s bid for history on the horizon.”

His response shook me. “That’s if they go ahead because this flu coming from China is a lot more worrying than people think.”

That was the first time Covid-19 really came onto my horizon and my word, did Nick prove to be right.

The Cheltenham Festival did go ahead, and, as has been well documented, rightly so with the instructions from the government at the time. However, anyone who was there will remember how uncomfortable it felt on Gold Cup day.

People forget we actually went to Uttoxeter to cover the Midlands Grand National the following day before lockdown kicked in and racing was shut down.

During that period ITV promised the sport that when it was ready to resume, we’d be ready to broadcast it and we’d aim to do it in a responsible fashion, being sensitive towards those who were suffering whilst showing our appreciation to the NHS staff and other key workers.

To enable us to get ready included a lot of stressful and chaotic rehearsals of presenting, directing and producing from numerous homes around the country.

When awards season comes around next year, I’d like to think the logistical and technical teams will be recognised for their efforts in leading the way with remote broadcasting.

How they managed to get both the Guineas’ on air I do not know. But what I do know is the presenting of those shows was the easy bit, despite the echoes and delays through the earpiece.

The interest in how we were broadcasting remotely was extraordinary. I had film and news crews and numerous journalists visiting my spare room studio which was then ‘politely’ described as a box room in The Sun!

Royal Ascot marked our return to the track and in the four years we’ve been the custodian of the terrestrial television rights, it is the broadcast I am most proud of.

It was the first major sports outside broadcast during lockdown and we did it with a skeleton team and ITV headquarters in London not even open.

It was flattering to be judged as if it was a normal show. That’s largely because racing proved to work so well behind closed doors, and for the viewer at home it came to also feel ‘normal’ in a time of chaos.

That week at Ascot, we were treated to some memorable moments on the track. My two favourites were Frankie’s long, disdainful look around on Stradivarius, and Hayley Turner winning the Sandringham again on Onassis, in a race that was so delayed we picked up early birds tuning in to watch The Chase.

Off the track, we gave each of the five days a different theme from the Royal Family to the NHS. We couldn’t round off each one with the usual singing from the bandstand, but to have Lord Lloyd Webber, the Kaiser Chiefs and a wonderful gospel choir singing us out was very special.

Even six months on I still struggle to watch Pixie Lott performing Let It Be with the review of the week without a tear in my eye.

Some of you might well remember James Martin teaching us how to make a scotch egg that week, three minutes of television among the 20 hours-plus we broadcast. It now constitutes a substantial meal, but at the time sparked rage amongst the racing fraternity, especially on social media!

I purposefully kept a number of messages that followed, some even demanding sackings and resignations, which still make me chuckle.

Was it a misjudgement? Probably. Was it the end of the world? No.

It’s a great example of the challenge of broadcasting racing on terrestrial television and the eggshells (pardon the pun) you are treading on. How to do the racing justice and at the same time entertain?

Make no mistake on ITV, we are in the entertainment industry. We don’t always get the balance right but the increasing viewing figures over our four-year tenure hopefully shows we get it right more often than we’re getting it wrong.

The easiest thing for me to do would be to appease the loud voices on social media and produce a show designed for the racing purist. But from January 1 2017 we promised to be different, and as we begin our new three-year contract our ethos remains the same; for racing to be accessible to all and as enjoyable as possible to as many people as possible.

As I say to the youngsters that I coach, if you start broadcasting to Twitter it’s time to turn out the lights as a presenter.

After Royal Ascot we moved to Epsom a month later than usual and the Jockey Club worked miracles to get the greenlight for the event.

Running the Derby and Oaks on the same day was an inspired move. Derby day is usually my favourite one to present, the only one that reminds me of my old job, fronting derbies at old fashioned football grounds like Anfield and White Hart Lane that used to literally rock with noise.

However, this year rather than the fairground, open-top buses, pomp and ceremony, we had marshals guarding a perimeter fence like a border crossing to keep people out.

It was a haunting sight. We then had the strangest running of the Classic I can remember, staged in eerie silence. Derby day was my racing low point of 2020.

Glorious Goodwood and the York Ebor Festival then did everything in their power to lift the spirits. The Sussex Stakes was the race of the year. It had the lot, sunshine, a spectacular setting, drama, controversy and a breath-taking winner in Mohaather.

Plus, it threw up a wonderful story. Marcus Tregoning won yet more friends and in turn did me a big favour by perfectly summing up the misery of having no crowd at the tracks.

As he eloquently said: “You don’t realise how awful and sad it is at the racecourse until you experience it.”

My one and only wish in 2021 is for crowds to return.

Goodwood and York put on great shows and led by two outstanding people in Adam Waterworth and William Derby did little things like provide free pizza and a concessionary food stall which made such a difference to the people on the ground.

The smaller tracks are suffering right now and one of the most satisfying aspects of the year has been the ability to shine a light on some of them.

On Monday this week Catterick became the last Yorkshire track for us to broadcast from, while it was wonderful to bring action from the likes of Perth, Kelso, Salisbury, Ripon and Wincanton too.

It’s been hard to stay upbeat at times and as a presenter you have to constantly remind yourself that millions are watching on from home.

Lots of tracks had the rug pulled from under their feet with their plans to have at least a small crowd back and 2021 looks like it could be brutal again.

The gambling review and a funding crisis loom large on the horizon.

Yet racing itself seems more popular than ever and I’m astonished by how many people have been enjoying the jumps racing over the last few months, culminating in 1.4 million tuning in for Saturday’s Ladbrokes King George VI Chase at Kempton.

It was a great day and Bryony Frost continues to help us as much as anyone to take racing to new places. Just look at the reaction to her win in news bulletins, daytime programmes and on the front and back pages of the newspapers.

It’s sad this week that we’ve had to stop broadcasting from the racecourse, setting up a hub at Kempton to lessen our footprint and travel, whilst trying to keep safe and keep broadcasting through the start of 2021.

It will be equally sad not to be on the podium at Cheltenham four years on from ‘that’ debut in a monsoon at Prestbury Park.

However, the priority is that racing keeps going and keeps putting smiles on people’s faces.

I wish everyone a Happy and Healthy New Year.