EIGHT racecourse managements in Britain will, weather permitting, be fully occupied on Boxing Day, leaving the team at Chepstow with another 24 hours to wait and worry before they stage their most important meeting of the year on Coral Welsh Grand National day.

“I must admit I’m not the best company until the big day is out of the way,” Chepstow executive director Phil Bell says. “I really can’t unwind until after the Welsh National.”

His apprehension is understandable. Having stage-managed three Boxing Day meetings at Fontwell before moving to south Wales, he had an uncomfortable introduction to Chepstow’s biggest day of the year. The 2012 fixture had to be abandoned and was run in January.

Another year there were four inspections before racing was given the go-ahead half an hour before the start-time of the first race.

And in 2013 his Christmas Day hardly started in festive fashion.

“I had a phone call at 7am, saying there was a power failure in the local area near the racecourse,” he recalls. “We’d got food in the freezers ready for Welsh National day and the first thought whether we would lose it all, which would have left us in a mess 48 hours later. Fortunately the power came back on at about 10am, so we were okay, but things like that can happen, and they’re not easy to rectify at this time of year.”

Balancing family matters and working issues is particularly hard over the Christmas period, Bell says.

“We have family staying with us and they won’t quite understand that I’ll be on tenterhooks about the weather and numbers of runners, for instance.

“We’ve two lots of parents coming down – my wife Sarah’s and mine. Sarah looks after the owners’ and trainers’ badges on Boxing Day, so she’ll be busy then, although she’ll be busy looking after the family on Christmas Day.

“Our two daughters, Iris, who’s nine, and Olivia, 12, can’t fully appreciate that both Sarah and I are occupied away from home at least some time over the Christmas period, and they have to amuse themselves on Boxing Day.

“There was a mix-up on the badge desk last year, which left fairly long queues. This year we’ve introduced a new office for the collection of badges, which Sarah will manage, so we hope we’ve sorted out that problem.

“At the same time I’ll be looking at the weather forecast and the numbers for hospitality. Last year we were still selling boxes on Boxing Day, but that won’t be the case this year because pre-sales have gone well. So that’s one headache we won’t have.

“We still might have a problem with the catering staff. Last year we had a lot of no-shows, from people who’d gone out on Boxing Day, woken up the next day and decided they wouldn’t come in to work.

“This year we’re overbooking by 40 staff, so that even if we get some no-shows, it shouldn’t affect our level of service, which is another worry.”

Taking account of Chepstow’s permanent staff also has to be considered.

“On Christmas Eve we’ll shut the office at about 3pm, and I’ll divert the answerphone to my mobile, just in case,” Bell explains. “The office will open again on Boxing Day, which will be a normal day, getting ready for race day. The only difference is that we’ll have half the staff in on Christmas Eve and half on Boxing Day.

“I can relax most on Christmas Eve, then on Christmas Day I’ll take a walk with the family and have a bit of dinner, but it’s still not easy, because Welsh National day is such an important day for the course.

“If the weather is iffy, I’ll walk the track with the dog again on Christmas Day, and then declarations are in on Boxing Day for six races, so I’ll be checking the numbers.”

On the other side of the coin, Bell reckons that Christmas time generates good team morale among racecourse staff, who are used to working unsocial hours.

“We had it at Fontwell,” he says. “It’s the game we work in and love, and generally it’s a good time of year to work, because people are usually friendly and in a good mood.

“A lot of people pack up work on 18 December for a fortnight. But at Chepstow, as well as racing over Christmas, we race on Easter Monday and lots of weekends and evenings, so the staff are working when other people are off. It’s important to be reasonable to them at other times of the year, and be relaxed about them having time off.

“Come the day and we sing the Welsh national anthem, it’s very special. All the stress of the festive period is worth it. I love it.

“I’d much rather be racing all through the year. I started at Brighton, and we stopped racing in October and didn’t start again until April. There wasn’t the buzz that we have here, especially when you get 12,000 people on course on Welsh National day.

“You don’t get rusty when you’re working all year. I wouldn’t swap it for anything.”