National Hunt Flat races, informally known as Bumper races, are flat races run under National Hunt racing rules in Britain and Ireland.
The main idea is for jump horses to gain racing experience on flat conditions of equal length, before beginning a career hurdling or chasing. Because of the lack of fences and hurdles, the horses sometimes run faster; however the low quality of many of these races, and that horses are only taking part to gain experience, often results in a slow pace. Bumpers are typically put at the end of a race meeting and such races are notorious for being difficult to predict the winner. The vast majority of National Hunt meetings in Ireland include a bumper. They are run much less frequently in Britain.
The term 'bumper' arose because in the past, only amateur riders were allowed to compete and had an ungainly bumping style in comparison to the professionals.
Bumpers are most commonly run over distances of 13 - 20 furlongs.
Famous quotes containing the words national, hunt, flat and/or race:
“I came here for one thing only, to try to help national Ireland—and if there is no such thing in existence then the sooner I pay for my illusions the better.”
—Roger Casement (1864–1916)
“In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, shepherd or critic.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“But pardon, gentles all,
The flat unraised spirits that hath dared
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth
So great an object.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“The parallel between antifeminism and race prejudice is striking. The same underlying motives appear to be at work, namely fear, jealousy, feelings of insecurity, fear of economic competition, guilt feelings, and the like. Many of the leaders of the feminist movement in the nineteenth-century United States clearly understood the similarity of the motives at work in antifeminism and race discrimination and associated themselves with the anti slavery movement.”
—Ashley Montagu (b. 1905)