South east England, south east Asia, south west Scotland

Heavens! The blog responses are coming in thick and fast - this is great! I had better deal with them. So here goes.

Firstly, Richard Sims. What can I say? Good to have you and your legion of fans on board. I don't know who your acolytes are (other than the one who posts as John Berry, obviously) but they are creating good banter. Do please continue to talk among yourselves.

Secondly, Alan Taylor. Yes, sorry Alan, I hadn't responded to your suggestion of giving priority to horses which had previously been ballotted out. I'm afraid that I just regard this as a non-starter. I think basically everyone is agreed that in a handicap one wants, if there are twelve places available in the field, to give them to the twelve best horses. Unfortunately, this isn't necessarily happening, as the places are being given to the twelve horses who have been luckiest in recent barrier draws. This has had quite a lot of coverage in the Racing Post - there was an article in which Milton Bradley explained it well - but looking closer to home for us Kadouchski illustrates the point perfectly. He was dropped a pound for his last run, but if he had drawn well he'd probably have gone up a pound. That really doesn't make much sense.

The Ryan Price analogy was an interesting one. It makes a refreshing change in this era of political correctness to see Ryan Price held up as someone whose racing strategy one should try to emulate, as I don't think anyone would get much sympathy nowadays if they pulled off a run of big coups in competitive handicaps by having the horses held back in their warm-up races and trained on what we can euphemistically call 'medication'. Great trainer though the master of Findon undoubtedly was, his methods really were of a different age, and I am sure that he certainly would not be turning in his grave to hear it said that some of his tricks would be more than frowned upon nowadays: in fact, I think he'd be pleased to hear people still discussing the master-strokes he used to get away with. But it just isn't true to say that Ryan Price used to try to get his horses down in the ratings list: there were no such things as ratings in those days, and what he did was try to get his horses into races with a winnable weight. That is exactly what I and all other trainers do, with the emphasis being on the word 'into': you don't get them into races if they are eliminated, and no trainer in history, including Ryan Price, has ever tried to get his horses so far down the handicap that he can't run them.

Just to broaden the discussion, can anyone give us some illustrations of how overseas racing nations handle the lottery of the draw? The only two countries where I think that I know how it works are Australia and South Africa. In Australia it is commonplace and regarded as acceptable to scratch because of the draw. If one decides against running the horse - for whatever reason including dissatisfaction with the draw or the ground or the horse's condition - one scratches and pays a scratching fee of something like a couple of hundred dollars. The horse in Brisbane which I part-own, Somewhere Safer, was scratched from a 1000m race at Doomben last Wednesday because she drew barrier ten. We had her entered there and at the Gold Coast three days later. We accepted with her for Doomben on the basis that if we drew low we would run - the 1000m course at Doomben is notorious for giving horses drawn wide very little chance - and if we drew high we'd scratch and run at the Gold Coast. So we drew ten and we scratched, as did several of the runners, leaving a field of something like six or seven. I think acceptances are taken three days before the race, and scratchings have to be in by something like 8.30 on race-morning so that the correct field - including which of the emergencies, ie reserves, have got a run - can be known by the time the TABs open. This works very well. In South Africa, I believe that the draw is done at time of entry, so that one can make an educated guess at roughly how wide one is going to be (obviously it is nothing more than an educated guess, as one doesn't know which of the others are going to declare) and base one's decision as to whether or not to declare on that. That again I believe works well. In both countries it is recognised that honest people - ie people who want to try to run well every time they run - might not necessarily want to run their horses from bad draws. I suspect that it is also implicitly recognised that, for the straightness of racing, it is a good thing that people shouldn't be rail-roaded into running their horses if they think that they haven't got a chance. I don't really see that it should be that shocking that I should question whether such an attitude should pertain in the UK as well.

Right - we move on. Mention of Ryan Price is very timely, because today I went to the funeral of another notable former member of the south-east racing fraternity, the ex-jump jockey Derek Bolton. I do not remember Derek riding, but he would have been a regular competitor at tracks such as Plumpton, Fontwell, Lingfield, Wye and Folkestone in the '50s and '60s. I suspect he might have ridden as M.Bolton, or M.D.Bolton, as (so I discovered today) his real name was Morton Derek Bolton. (To continue the confusion, his brother John, who trained until quite recently, was also M. - or M.J. - Bolton). I only knew Derek later in his life when he was travelling head lad for his former brother-in-law, Michael Jarvis. I know (because I have been told) that he was a tremendous horseman, and I know (because of my own recollections of him) that he was a really nice man. His last years were very tough for him, because his health was very bad. He had lived a hard life and it took its toll, and consequently it came as something of a surprise to discover that he was only 73 when he died: he looked more than that ten years ago. But, while my memories of Derek are of a man who didn't look well, they are also of a man with a smile on his face, whose concerns for others were greater than his concerns for himself. Consequently it was lovely to see a photograph of him from his riding days on the front of the service sheet: his face younger and healthier, but the smile the same. He would have been proud to see so many people at his funeral, particularly the community of racing professionals who began their racing lives with him in the south east, such as Michael Jarvis, John Wilsoncroft and Chris Hinson. I didn't know Derek nearly as well as most of the other people at the funeral, but I knew him well enough to know that he was a man I liked and respected.

Another man whom I like and respect is Brett Doyle, a jockey who has ridden us a few winners over the years on horses such as Archirondel, Critical Stage and Mozie Cat. Brett's problem (or asset, depending on how one looks at these things) is that he lacks the single-mindedness necessary to make it to (and more pertinently stay at) the top of any profession, never mind one as cut-throat as race-riding. But he certainly doesn't lack the talent, and he certainly doesn't lack decency, intelligence and integrity, which isn't something one can say about all of his colleagues. Anyway, best news of the day is that Brett, who is currently back riding in Hong Kong, got off the mark this weekend at the third meeting of the new season there, in the process reaching the landmark of 100 HK winners. I believe that an early-season winner is essential for a jockey arriving in or returning to Hong Kong, so fingers crossed that that success will see him up and running now. From a British point of view, it is possible not to realise what a great worldwide career Brett has so far enjoyed, because it is a long time since he won the Sussex Stakes on Sayyedati (and earned a real roasting from Clive Brittain in the process for giving a victory salute - that dates it if it was in the era when such things weren't yet considered a fact of life) but he is one of the world's great jockeys, as well as a really nice guy, and I hope that we'll be saluting his victories for years to come.

If that was the happiest recent news, the saddest was reading in the Racing Post that Phil Tuck has lost his job as a stipendiary steward (as David Hancock has as a starter). I've long regarded Phil as an absolutely first-class stipendiary steward, as well as a man it is very easy to like and respect. Sadly, though, it appears from the article that he was found to have fiddled his expenses claims, and he has paid the price. That is just so very sad. I'd actually assumed that all BHA employees fiddle their expenses claims, but presumably this story tells us that that isn't the case. So in that sense I suppose this ought to be an uplifting tale, but I'm afraid that I haven't been able to find it thus.

And finally, to end (as usual) on a note of farce. I don't know if any readers of this blog get as much interest as I do from the running plans of Donal Nolan's stable, but as usual his contribution to the Scottish circuit was a good one. The Doonside Cup often figures prominently in Donal's plans, and good old Lord Advocate used often used to run in it. I particularly remember him doing so as a ten-year-old in the year (1999) in which Largesse won it. Lord Advocate that year started at 200/1, which was a decent price in a six-horse field - and he didn't finish last, as he beat Silence Reigns, the Michael Stoute-trained 6/4 favourite. And he won the best-turned-out. I was very pleased, therefore, to see that Donal this year had Defi engaged. He was priced up in the Racing Post SP forecast at 500/1 and, even by the usual standards of the stable's Spotlights, his was a good one: "Plater who would need an act of God to win". Sadly he was a non-runner ('unsuitable ground', which was an interesting one as the ground was never going to be anything other than heavy - maybe Donal was dissatisfied with being drawn 3 of 10!). Compared to that, his two runners in the Class Two conditions race at Hamilton the next day got off lightly: both were priced up at 200/1, with Howards Prince getting the Spotlight "Poor form these days" and Seafield Towers "Seemingly best he can hope for is that he can finish ahead of his stablemate". I don't think that you need me to tell you that they did indeed occupy the last two places - and sadly Seafield Towers wasn't able to beat his stablemate. The SP forecast for both horses proved spot-on, but Donal's other runner for the day - Jazz Stick in the sprint handicap - started at a significantly shorter price (150/1) before finishing tenth of ten, thirty lengths behind the second last horse. But ... at least he was able to run them, so don't say you weren't warned when you see Kadouchski lining up for the Champion Stakes and Run From Nun in the Sun Chariot!