The Oakley meeting is booked to take place at Brafield-on-the-Green in Northamptonshire next season as planned.
Rumours that the course might close were circulating in the spring, but the meeting has been included in the provisional fixtures’ list and secretary Rachael Hollely-Thompson confirmed it is green light for go.
She said: “We couldn’t race in 2020 when the lockdown was imposed just a few days before our fixture and the following year we didn’t want to race behind closed doors. I can only assume that’s where the rumours started, but we’re still going and we held a meeting last season.”
That fixture was blighted by two walkovers, but Hollely-Thompson expects a better outcome next time when the meeting takes place on Sunday, March 19.
She said: “We clashed with the Belvoir meeting [at Garthorpe] last year, but that fixture has gone back a week. There is a lot of congestion at that time of year, but we will be looking closely at the races we put on and could change some.
“We attracted a very good crowd, and we staged an impromptu dog show while the walkovers took place which went down well and raised funds for the Ukrainian Humanity Appeal. That received some good publicity on social media. We also stage pony racing and a parade of hounds, so while we wanted good competitive point-to-point races there was enough to keep most people interested.
“Our first meeting [of the point-to-point committee] takes place in October when we will be discussing all aspects of next season’s fixture.”
Master Templar, under Gina Andrews, in fine form at last season's Oakley meeting *photo Graham Bishop