Lingfield’s opening day of its Winter Million fixture has survived a precautionary inspection and racing will go ahead as planned.

Temperatures did drop to almost minus 4C at around 7am, but just 90 minutes later the mercury had started to rise and it was already up to minus 2C

The forecast is for it to reach a high of up to 5C throughout the day, and clerk of the course George Hill had no qualms about giving the meeting the go ahead before the scheduled 9am check.

“We’re fine to race and we’re getting the information out as quick as we can,” said Hill.

On Saturday action is on the all-weather track, but it returns to the jumps course on Sunday where the feature is the £150,000 Fleur De Lys Chase.

Hill added: “We’re going to cover up again after racing tonight. We’ve been covered since last Sunday and it worked.

“Whether we need to inspect ahead of Sunday we don’t know yet.”