Before we go any farther, we should salute some recent victors. I think that Patriotic might have been mentioned on this blog previously; and now he can be mentioned again, having won towards the end of last week. That was great as I'm always delighted to see Chris Dwyer train a winner. Chris is as good a trainer as he is nice a man - and that's saying something - so it went without saying that he'd win with Patriotic this winter. And what's particularly nice is that his win came under Josh Crane, who's a really nice lad. Josh came down from Alan Swinbank's stable a couple of years ago to fill the role of stable apprentice with John Ryan, a role which had been vacated by Ryan Powell. Ryan had ridden plenty of winners when apprenticed to John, but
Josh found it harder, both because the stable had a leaner season and also because he's a bit bigger. Anyway, Josh (pictured taking Henry's Hero down the Rowley Mile for a stalls test last September) now works for Chris and, although he can't ride below, I think, 9 stone 1lb, he still has a license and takes the odd ride. And it was really good to see him win on Patriotic as he deserves success. As does our neighbour Charlie McBride, whose 2012 has got off to a good start courtesy of a double at Lingfield two Saturdays ago. You can see (sort of) Charlie riding across the Severals away from the Heath this morning, even if the glare of the sun makes him hard to discern - and even if Alcalde's ears fill the shot more than Charlie does anyway. A further bit of good news from that stable is that Charlie's son Sean is heading down under a week today. Charlie has a brother who
lives near Flemington and Sean is going there and will be working for expatriate Englishman Nigel Blackiston, who has a successful stable on the track. Nigel used to work in Newmarket for Tony Hide, while Charlie would have been working for Bruce Hobbs. Nigel was formerly foreman for Leon Corstens in Bart Cummings' Melbourne stable (and gave me a great tour of it in the spring of 1991, when I particularly remember seeing Let's Elope, Shaftesbury Avenue and Shiva's Revenge, who were collectively about to dominate the Carnival) and has done really well since setting up as a trainer himself, his best horse having been the Group One winner Littorio. Among his team currently is a Refuse To Bend four-year-old (whose name escapes me) who won last season's VRC St Leger. Anyway, that's grand because Sean (pictured here alongside his dad last week in Rayes Lane) is a really nice lad, and I'm sure that he'll have a wonderful trip.
As the photograph of Charlie this morning suggests, it was rather a splendid morning. Once the sun was up we had some lovely views over the snow. It clouded over later in the day and got a bit milder, maybe one or two degrees above freezing, so we ended up with some thawing, but we've still got a good covering of snow which ought to last as it's going to freeze again tonight, be very cold again tomorrow and then freeze really hard the next two nights. Tomorrow morning's conditions could be quite dicey if the thawed snow re-freezes, but we'll
cross that bridge when we come to it. Today's underfoot conditions were fairly safe, because one's always fine if one has plenty of snow to ride upon; it's when it becomes compacted, or thaws and then re-freezes, that icy surfaces appear. Anyway, we picked our way carefully to have some good trots on the Heath this morning on some largely undisturbed snow, so it's a case this difficult week of so far, so good. The photos are fairly self-explanatory, other than the rather eerie
second one of us going around the far side of Bury Hill. It was rather lovely because the sun was up by this stage (in fact, this photograph was taken after the sunny one of Charlie and after the first one in this paragraph) but one's in the shade from the trees at that point - and the atmosphere was made even more spooky by the bank of mist which had risen up from the snow and into which we were riding. Anyway, that was today and rather fun it was too. The novelty of snow is sure to wear off sooner or later, but we'll keep enjoying it for as long as we are able.
Before we go any farther, we should salute some recent victors. I think that Patriotic might have been mentioned on this blog previously; and now he can be mentioned again, having won towards the end of last week. That was great as I'm always delighted to see Chris Dwyer train a winner. Chris is as good a trainer as he is nice a man - and that's saying something - so it went without saying that he'd win with Patriotic this winter. And what's particularly nice is that his win came under Josh Crane, who's a really nice lad. Josh came down from Alan Swinbank's stable a couple of years ago to fill the role of stable apprentice with John Ryan, a role which had been vacated by Ryan Powell. Ryan had ridden plenty of winners when apprenticed to John, but
Josh found it harder, both because the stable had a leaner season and also because he's a bit bigger. Anyway, Josh (pictured taking Henry's Hero down the Rowley Mile for a stalls test last September) now works for Chris and, although he can't ride below, I think, 9 stone 1lb, he still has a license and takes the odd ride. And it was really good to see him win on Patriotic as he deserves success. As does our neighbour Charlie McBride, whose 2012 has got off to a good start courtesy of a double at Lingfield two Saturdays ago. You can see (sort of) Charlie riding across the Severals away from the Heath this morning, even if the glare of the sun makes him hard to discern - and even if Alcalde's ears fill the shot more than Charlie does anyway. A further bit of good news from that stable is that Charlie's son Sean is heading down under a week today. Charlie has a brother who 
lives near Flemington and Sean is going there and will be working for expatriate Englishman Nigel Blackiston, who has a successful stable on the track. Nigel used to work in Newmarket for Tony Hide, while Charlie would have been working for Bruce Hobbs. Nigel was formerly foreman for Leon Corstens in Bart Cummings' Melbourne stable (and gave me a great tour of it in the spring of 1991, when I particularly remember seeing Let's Elope, Shaftesbury Avenue and Shiva's Revenge, who were collectively about to dominate the Carnival) and has done really well since setting up as a trainer himself, his best horse having been the Group One winner Littorio. Among his team currently is a Refuse To Bend four-year-old (whose name escapes me) who won last season's VRC St Leger. Anyway, that's grand because Sean (pictured here alongside his dad last week in Rayes Lane) is a really nice lad, and I'm sure that he'll have a wonderful trip.
As the photograph of Charlie this morning suggests, it was rather a splendid morning. Once the sun was up we had some lovely views over the snow. It clouded over later in the day and got a bit milder, maybe one or two degrees above freezing, so we ended up with some thawing, but we've still got a good covering of snow which ought to last as it's going to freeze again tonight, be very cold again tomorrow and then freeze really hard the next two nights. Tomorrow morning's conditions could be quite dicey if the thawed snow re-freezes, but we'll 
cross that bridge when we come to it. Today's underfoot conditions were fairly safe, because one's always fine if one has plenty of snow to ride upon; it's when it becomes compacted, or thaws and then re-freezes, that icy surfaces appear. Anyway, we picked our way carefully to have some good trots on the Heath this morning on some largely undisturbed snow, so it's a case this difficult week of so far, so good. The photos are fairly self-explanatory, other than the rather eerie 
second one of us going around the far side of Bury Hill. It was rather lovely because the sun was up by this stage (in fact, this photograph was taken after the sunny one of Charlie and after the first one in this paragraph) but one's in the shade from the trees at that point - and the atmosphere was made even more spooky by the bank of mist which had risen up from the snow and into which we were riding. Anyway, that was today and rather fun it was too. The novelty of snow is sure to wear off sooner or later, but we'll keep enjoying it for as long as we are able.
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