Opposition to plans to sell Kempton Park for housing grew on Wednesday with critics calling on the Jockey Club to "sit down with leading figures from National Hunt racing to explore options to save the iconic course," according to Mark Souster of the LONDON TIMES. Grand National-winning trainer Oliver Sherwood said, "I don’t think we want to just lie down and accept it." Sherwood is "not alone in feeling that the loss of the course would have profoundly negative long-term implications for the sport." Richard Burridge, who owns four-time King George VI Chase winner Desert Orchid, said, "From a racing point of view no one could applaud this. No one could seriously say that losing Kempton and replacing it with an all-weather track at Newmarket is a good day for racing." The Jockey Club announced on Tuesday that it was offering Kempton’s 300-acre site for the development of up to 3,000 homes, "some of it potentially on green belt land." If planning permission is granted, the King George would be switched to Sandown Park in '21 and a "new floodlit all-weather track" would be built at Newmarket. However, "in a new twist," Ian Harvey, the leader of Spelthorne Borough Council, which is looking at options to meet housing needs, is reportedly "against any scheme" that impacts the green belt. The sale of Kempton Park would generate at least £100M ($121.6M) and underpin a £500M ($608M) strategic decade-long investment by the Jockey Club in all its courses, "which it said is vital to its prosperity" (LONDON TIMES, 1/12).
