Desert like conditions greet us for another scorching Thursday morning at the track as we begin early preparations for the visitors from Eastbourne.
The track surface is like concrete and still shows the bumps that we had tried to even out after our last fixture. However, with a combination of regular watering and some careful grading we are reasonably hopeful of producing a surface just like the one that provided such sensational racing during the Coventry meeting.
For once, the water supplies are adequate - all of the tanks are full and so we start our first major soaking of the track at 8.30am.
We need to get water right down into the base and then begin to work the surface with the grader and then the harrow screen. With the surface wet, but not sloppy, we can begin to prepare a smooth track that we can then add grip to later in the afternoon.
We top dress some areas of the track where there are the inevitable troughs and add more than a bucket of new shale to the entrance to turn 1 after Gerald has run the big blade over it. We also find a huge deposit of sand under the surface near where the greyhound traps are stored on our track during dog meetings. This has to be dug out and then the chasm filled with shale and then packed down thoroughly.
The four plant tubs adjacent to the starting gates have all been planted up with plants and compost donated by A C Nurden (Garden and Building Supplies Ltd) of Malmesbury. The problem of keeping the tubs watered has been overcome by some clever hydroponic work sponsored and manufactured at The Malmesbury Pottery - biscuit fired containers that allow water to be drawn out through the clay only when the surrounding soil is dry. Clever stuff. The Pottery has sponsored one tub while the Blunsdon Blog has entered the world of high prestige advertising by sponsoring the other one. Has the fact that we now have our own little area of prettiness got anything to do with the imminent arrival of Sky cameras for our next meeting? Of course not!!
The new top dressing is looking good and we are optimistic that, if everything goes to plan then we will have another great track for Eastbourne.
But then the Law of Sod kicked in. Stealthily dark clouds started to gather and the first sensation of moisture was felt in the air. It's 3.30pm and getting close to the time when we would be starting our major watering which would be followed by heavy grading, ripping and tyre packing (to produce the numerous racing lines that we have developed this year).
As it begins to drizzle we get out and hastily tyre pack the new top dressing - we don't want it turning into a muddy slush on top of the surface.
It continues to drizzle for the next hour. We make hasty telephone calls to other tracks and contacts. It's chucking it down on the south coast and the rain is heavy in Oxford. There are squally showers in Newport and the Marlborough Downs are fast disappearing to the south of the stadium.
This is dreadful - quite the worst scenario that we can imagine. The drizzle isn't enough to keep the track in good shape yet if we water and it rains more heavily we might find ourselves with waterlogged track.
It is now raining quite heavily and water is beginning to puddle on the tyre packed surface. We cannot rip up the surface to get rid of the surface water because that would turn to racing surface into mud and slime.
In a desperate attempt to salvage the track we top dress the entire surface with new, dry red shale. At least this will stop the puddling. We desperately don't want to put down saw dust unless we absolutely have to. Whilst saw dust will soak up the extra water it will ruin the track for future meetings.
Umbrellas appear in the pits as the riders arrive, each one with tales of woe and of heavy rain showers on the way here. We can only sit and wait. At this stage one option is to pray for a real downpour to put us out of our misery.
As water pools by the kickboards, Rico's spare bike looks sadly neglected under its blue and white umbrella. At least the rain is now down to a drizzle again.
At 6pm Jupiter Pluvious relents and the clouds clear above Blunsdon. We are able to lightly rip the starts and the exist to turns 2 and 4 on the inside but any other work is simply down to grading and working the surface with the harrow sheet.
As we expected, the track wasn't right for the meeting and we were left desperately disappointed. The top was wet and heavy but below that it was simply too dry and the racing surface soon began to cake up.
The influence of the rain at crucial times had meant that we hadn't been able to properly control the amount of water in the track.
It really was a case of Every Which Way ... You Lose!!
