Rigby Taylor’s amenity products have played a key role in Great Yarmouth Racecourse being named the best flat course in the Racecourse Association’s prestigious grounds staff awards 2018.

Combined with high-class groundscare routines led by head groundsman Richard Bradley, the use of a host of products as well as continual advice and support by Rigby Taylor this year saw the Great Yarmouth team succeed with a “well-covered and great-coloured” course during a racing season that experienced the hottest summer on record.

According to Clerk of the Course, Richard Aldous, the award reflects “both the success of the grounds team’s expertise as well as the efficacy of the products” that have been used at the site for the past five years or so.

“We use a range of Rigby Taylor products to ensure the track consistently looks and performs superbly,” he says, “and we’ve been especially pleased with the combination of using the Fineturf 6-0-18 and PolyPro 25-3-15 slow-release fertilisers and Microlite Activ-8 (both 12-0-12 and 6-0-24).

“Together these have enabled us to produce a track that particularly this year has received laudatory comments from jockeys, trainers and owners.”

He continues: “We re-laid the turf on the straight in 2015 to ensure we could attract top-class horses to Great Yarmouth and to provide opportunities, particularly for horses which might go on to big festival meetings such as Royal Ascot and Glorious Goodwood. This has certainly been the case this season and I’m in no doubt that the amenity products we use have played a significant part in that success.”

Staging 23 meeting each season on the course, from April through to October, the Great Yarmouth team utilises a year-round programme of Rigby Taylor soil testing regimes and products, including the Propel-R wetting agent, liquid seaweed, Greenor systemic herbicide, and Delta Sport granular and Microsol soluble fertilisers, as well as overseeding with the R14 100% perennial rye seed. This, says Richard, “not only germinates quickly and presents a sward that holds together excellently, but it also is very wear- and disease-tolerant”.

With expert groundscare routines coupled with regular visits from Rigby Taylor’s Technical Sales Representative Mark Keysell who, adds Richard, “is always on hand and offers an awful lot of support”, the Great Yarmouth team is happy that everything is being done to ensure they stay on track for successful racing at the 300-year-old racecourse.