On 5 October 1985, the week after World of Sport ended, Channel 4 took over ITV's Saturday afternoon coverage.

From the beginning of 1986, however, the amount of racing covered, especially on Saturday afternoons, was substantially reduced with coverage focussing on Newmarket, Epsom, Doncaster, York, Sandown Park, Kempton alongside visits to Ayr for the Scottish Grand National and Ayr Gold Cup meetings and Newcastle for the Eider Chase, Northumberland Plate and Fighting Fifth Hurdle.

Race meetings dropped would be the small/medium tracks that were covered by World Of Sport Warwick, Nottingham, Market Rasen, Ripon, Beverley, Towcester, Stratford, Catterick, Fakenham, Fontwell, Sedgefield, Plumpton, Redcar, Thirsk, Hereford, Lingfield Park, Hexham, Kelso, Worcester, Uttoxeter, Salisbury, Wincanton, Southwell, Windsor, Wolverhampton, Wetherby although the BBC occasionally televised meetings from those tracks mostly the Saturday cards on Grandstand (Most of these courses would return from around 1993).

The reason for the change was said to be that ratings had dipped for most of the big meetings that used to be broadcast on the BBC up to 2012 since the move to Channel 4.

As well as the UK and Ireland Channel 4 has covered racing in 8 countries France, Germany, UAE, Japan, Hong Kong, Australia, USA and Canada.

Called The Morning Line, the programme aired for 25 minutes as part of Channel 4's recently launched breakfast television service.

Alice Plunkett and Emma Spencer filled in as presenters when both Balding and Luck were absent, and also served as interviewers and reporters on the programme alongside Gina Harding and Rishi Persad.

Jim McGrath, Graham Cunningham, Mick Fitzgerald and occasionally former champion jockey AP McCoy provided analysis, whilst Tanya Stevenson, Brian Gleeson and Tom Lee were the programme's betting correspondents.