Help - Enthusiasm needed

[mowgli77]

We are just a month away from Cheltenham and for the first time in years I'm not really that bothered. I've booked the week off work as usual but I've just struggled to get into the jumps season at all despite going to quite a few meetings with my racing pass. I started to get a bit bored of the sport towards the end of the jumps season and have not really found much enthusiasm for the jumps season at all. A dreadful list for the 10 to follow hasn't helped, I've hardly got any horses on a regular list to follow and there are loads of key races and festival trials that I haven't seen. I don't know if I feel saturated with possibly too much racing and it certainly isn't due to a losing streak as I hardly bet anymore unless it is the weekend or a major festival like the Dante, Ebor, Leger meetings etc. I check the results and try to check the following days runners each night but the names are all a blur and nothing much stands out. I don't know if taking my camera to racing is a hindrance, maybe Billyhills and Robertob know what I mean but sometimes it's hard to go there and try to get some decent photos and also take the betting seriously so a few times I've left the camera at home. I'm off to Kempton next weekend for the first time and really want to recapture the love I had for the sport. I often alternate my weekends between football (Bradford City season ticket - maybe that's depressing me) or horse racing and try get to a meeting every 2-3 weeks dependant on racing and football fixtures. I've looked through some of the main Cheltenham races and have no idea if some of the runners are any good, the names don't ring any bells in some races. Maybe I should get involved on here again more but I'm spending less time on forums in general, not just this one but the football ones too, finding if I have nothing to say then why bother posting. I just feel like I'm going through a phase of being a bit bored with racing and lacking enthusiasm which is sad as it has always been a sport I have loved, way back to horses like Halling, Bosra Sham, Pentire and some of my favourite jumps horses like My Way De Solzen, Voy Por Ustedes etc. Hoping to get some enthusiasm back before next weekend and try to get focused by March so I can enjoy Cheltenham like everyone else. I made myself watch the Irish racing on Sunday and quite enjoyed it, would have loved to see Tidal Bay win the Irish Hennessy. Anyone else had a phase where they were either bored with the sport, lacked enthusiasm and what did you do? :ok

[Blazing Bailey]

Re: Help - Enthusiasm needed I think the jumps have been a bit harder to follow this season because I cant really think of too many horses that have excited me and due to the weather and the racing schedule, a lot of them have steered clear from each other too. At least the big 3 over in Ireland have been racing each other but even they have the feel of an egg and spoon race. I have had occasions where I have been a little disillusioned with the sport but that's generally when I go through a quite spell on the betting side and I start losing my discipline so I either go through the results again and work out where I am going wrong or take a week or so off. Depending on how much time you have on your hands, maybe go through some of the flagship races and watch the videos of the main contenders before watching or listening to one of the many podcasts or youtube videos there are about. It tends to gee me up a bit because I think 'whats this tw*t going on about!' before slagging them all off before someone agrees with my opinion! :) If you do look at any, the best two I have seen/heard are the JP Festival videos and the Final Furlong Podcast, the latter of which is quite entertaining at times too. Depends on whether its your cup of tea though! Whatever happens, I'm sure the game will work its way back into your heart at some point before this the festival starts.