Snowfalls postpone the Cheltenham Gold Cup by a month

[Weather-history]

The Cheltenham Gold Cup has been delayed (1987 was a well known instance) and or raced through snow in the past but on the 16th March 1978, the meeting was postponed until the 12th of April as disruptive snowfalls hit parts of the south.

 

 

  

[Fergpfc]

 Weather-history remember it well.snowed all day here.those were the days

[damianslaw]

Looking at the synoptics must have been evaporative cooling at play, shows don't need very cold uppers in mid March to produce snow, just enough precipitation and modest uppers.

[I remember Atlantic 252]

different now though Damian, snow line surely higher up now

[A Face like Thunder]

I don't remember this at all and neither, it appears, does Philip Eden in his very good book on British Weather disasters. I was living in Surrey at the time , so we may have missed it but I'm a bit surprised that Eden didn't pick up on it. Informative as always, thanks Weather-history

[andreas]

Here's my diary entry for 16 March 1978; I grew up in Cheltenham: 

"Heavy snow in morning, worst for a few years, four inches overnight. They say that on the radio as racing in the Cheltenham Gold Cup week is abandoned. I make a snowman this afternoon and a castle. It melts fast though, and the snowman falls down."