Cheltenham acknowledged yesterday that even the blooming health of National Hunt racing cannot be immune from the financial climate but it is a quite different crisis that threatens the start of the jumps winter. Anger is gathering over the state of the Wetherby track and a high-ranking inspection today could put the Charlie Hall Chase meeting on November 1 at risk of trainer boycott or even abandonment.

Wetherby, traditionally the finest jumps venue in the North, has undergone relaying and reconfiguration because of the widening of the adjacent A1. Plainly, it has not gone to plan and, having run several meetings last season as all-hurdles cards, disquiet over the surface has become so deafening that it threatens the ability of the course to stage its prime fixtures.

The British Horseracing Authority (BHA), responding to concern voiced by leading trainers, is dispatching three of its four course inspectors to the Yorkshire venue today. Rupert Arnold, chief executive of the National Trainers Federation, will also be present, along with a number of trainers or their respresentatives.

The stakes are high. If the inspectorate concludes - as trainers have been telling them with increasing venom - that parts of the home straight are “hard”, Wetherby's opening meeting next Wednesday and, more critically, the Charlie Hall fixture that many regard as the true launch of jumping, could be called off.

Owen Byrne, communications officer of the BHA, confirmed yesterday: “The course has not been bedding in as well as hoped and parts of the track are very firm. A delegation of our inspectorate will be there tomorrow and, if there is hard going, next week's meeting will be abandoned.”

Implicit in that statement is a threat to the two-day Charlie Hall meeting. Arnold explained: “Everybody is concerned that the ground is not going to be safe and the overriding interest is horse welfare. The Charlie Hall meeting is uppermost in people's minds but we've been encouraging the BHA to undertake this type of inspection for some while. A lot of trainers feel very strongly.”

As those present today will include Ferdy Murphy and Harvey Smith, husband of trainer Sue and a scrupulous course-walker, those views will be forcibly expressed. Murphy said yesterday: “I did some damage to Aces Four in the Charlie Hall last year and I won't be risking it again unless things have changed hugely from when I last walked it a week ago.”

Alan King is sending his assistant, Noel Williams, to the inspection and he said: “I have horses earmarked for various races on Charlie Hall day but if what I hear is right, they won't be going.”

Cheltenham's season also starts next week and the course was being watered even in yesterday's rain. Inside the royal box, a cold shower of realism was dispensed as the executive of jumping's headquarters admitted the anxieties of sustaining their £23million business in a recession.

Peter McNiele, the director of sponsorship, said: “These are the most challenging times we have had for at least a decade. Our market is resilient but we are realistic. We are heavily reliant on the construction and financial services industries and both are suffering a fair amount of turbulence.”

Edward Gillespie, the managing director, said that corporate hospitality at the four-day Festival next March could be hit. “Bookings by the big buyers are considerably slower than normal. Closer to the time, we will decide whether some of the usual tented village won't be required, in which case we might have a different mix of people this season.”

Despite these signals of concern, Cheltenham's position as the brand leader will insure against disaster. Remarkably, indeed, prize-money for the Festival has risen again, to £3.59million, and the 26 races are now worth an average of £138,000. The most controversial change to the running order sees the County Hurdle moved from its traditional role as the final race of the meeting and replaced by the Grand Annual Chase.