Fans of Britain's most scenic racecourse oversee U-turn after social media ban

24 January 2024 , 11:38

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Hexham racecourse's X account was taken down (Image: Getty)

Britain’s most scenic racecourse has been restored to the social media platform X - formerly Twitter - after its account was taken down.

Hexham, in Northumberland, is one of jumping’s most popular tracks which has established a fanbase of more than 14,000 followers since it joined what was then Twitter.

But it disappeared on Sunday night to the consternation of supporters who, led by trainer Fergal O’Brien’s account, launched a campaign to have the account restored.

Local Conservative MP Guy Opperman also became involved and after four days of silence, Hexham announced its return with the message, “What have we missed?”

The reason behind the racecourse’s temporary banishment came down to an issue with social media manager Sean Tasker-Brown’s eligibility to use the platform.

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“On Sunday evening I was asked to put my date of birth into X and got locked out,” said Tasker-Brown.

“Basically this was because when the account was created I would have been under the age of 13. I wasn’t Involved in running it then, which they didn’t know.

“I am 24 now and had started doing the social media a year ago, but on Sunday X was asking for age verification.”

Hexham boss Robert Whitelock alerted his X followers that the account had disappeared, which caught the attention of the O’Brien team and others.

“The whole thing gathered traction from there with Fergal O’Brien Racing starting the #FreeHexham campaign,” said Tasker-Brown.

“Our local MP Guy Opperman had a contact who turned out to be very high up in X. It wasn’t Elon Musk but a second in command to the CEO.

“After an email conversation with him I got back in on Wednesday night. We are back to 14.6k followers and we have actually gained more as a result of this.”

He added: “We are not racing again until March 14 and have a Cheltenham preview night on March 6 and we have probably come out of it all quite well from the publicity we got.”

Jon Lees