A mighty meeting

What a terrific Festival. It's very rare for me to go to the races if we don't have a runner, and we didn't have one at Cheltenham - but it felt as if we did with Gina riding in the charity race yesterday, and I was delighted to be there. And I was even more delighted by how well she did. She did everything right. She got away smartly, she got her mount On Khee (an habitual front-runner) over to the inside in the lead, and then she got her to settle. The mare ran along at just the correct pace, not too fast, without fighting Gina, and then Gina resisted the temptation to ask her to do too much too soon, which is always a temptation on front-runners. Even so, the mare got tired at the end and faded a bit to finish fifth, but that was her correct position and Gina had given her every chance and assistance. So that was just lovely. I was so pleased to be there and to spend the day with Gina's family and the rest of the team, and it was just a very happy occasion. And what was really nice was that one was left in no doubt at all about what a very special occasion it was by the ecstatic delight which Tina Cook showed after riding the winner Pasha Bere. Tina has won an Olympic medal and grew up in a household (she, of course, being the recently-deceased Josh Gifford's daughter) where success in big races was a regular event) and so one might think that victory in a charity race would be rather small beer compared to the sporting heights to which she has been accustomed. Not so: she was as excited as a 7-lb claimer would be if he found himself winning the Derby. And that was really, really lovely. It was good to see some of the other riders, eg Niall Hannity and Jo McCain, and it was also great that David Pipe saddled On Khee shortly after producing one of the training performances of the season, having kept Salut Flo under wraps for three months during the peak of the season because he believed the horse to be good enough to win the Mildmay Of Flete (I'll call it that even if nobody else will, simply because I am more than baffled by Cheltenham's logic which says that Lord Mildmay, who will forever remain one of the true greats of steeplechasing history, should no longer have a race named in his honour, while Johnny Henderson should) off his current rating and didn't want that rating to rise. That's a very bold thing for owner and trainer to do, because if anything happens other than the horse winning the race, then the season has been a f***-up. But win it the horse did, and if fine style too, despite not having raced for over three months. That really was virtuoso training.

Other than that, of course, the highlight was the peerless Big Bucks' winning his fourth consecutive Ladbroke's World Hurdle. We were thinking the other day if a horse had won the same race at the Festival four times running since Golden Miller (I know that some, eg Persian War and Best Mate, have won at four consecutive Festivals, but that's not quite the same) and we couldn't think that one had. But if there was one between Golden Miller and Big Buck's, please let us know. I'd never previously been at the races when Big Bucks' was running, so it was terrific to see him. He's just such a star. And looks so lovely too. After the race, which was a wonderful contest, he did two laps of honour around the parade ring as he was getting such a magnificent hero's reception, and he looked just so content. It was very, very special. I'm only sorry that my photograph of him doesn't do him anything like justice.

Finally, praise where praise is due. I criticise the BHA fairly frequently, but on this occasion I have to pay tribute to the helpfulness of the personnel in the licensing department. Flat jockeys' and apprentices' license seem to expire each year on 17th March, which is tomorrow (Saturday). So they all need a new license from Sunday onwards. One is supposed to send in the renewal application at least two weeks in advance, but my inefficiency meant that Hannah's application was only posted last Saturday - which, the Royal Mail being what it is nowadays, meant that it only arrived in London on Tuesday. And we want her to ride Kadouchski at Kempton on Monday (one of our two intended runners that day, Dr Darcey over hurdles at Southwell being the other). Anyway, the staff in the licensing department, who were probably cursing their luck that their busiest week (because, of course, we were far from the only people to send in the forms at the eleventh hour) had turned out to be Cheltenham week, could not have been more helpful, and could not have been more pleasant about it either. Thanks entirely to their good will and to their efficiency and industry, Hannah's new license had indeed been issued by close of business today, which it obviously needed to be for her to ride on Monday, with the weekend looming. And they deserve a big pat on the back for that.