Remembering Jolly Jim

Rather a sad note, but I feel that we should pay our respects to Jim Ratcliffe, who recently passed away. You might remember Mark Tompkins training a horse fairly early in his training career called Jolly Jim - well, that was Jim. You'll have seen Jim Ratcliffe horseboxes doing the rounds over a period of many years, cream coloured with black lettering. His firm was nearly the biggest in town for quite a while and had regular, long-term contracts with numerous stables, most notably Sir Mark's. Jim and his wife Jenny also had a stud in Chippenham at one time, and generally they were just part of the town's furniture - and a popular part too, as Jenny is a saint, and Jim, rogue though he was, was a very, very likeable one. He was also a master of hounds with a pack some distance away for many years which seemed almost unfeasible, but that was Jim - he lived life to the full and did so with a smile on his face. He had the odd horse over the years with various of the trainers who used his firm, including William Jarvis and James Eustace, and he owned quite a few winners. Jim's final years probably weren't happy ones, sadly, but I'll remember him as a popular Newmarket character who had a friendly smile and greeting for everyone. I'll remember him as Jolly Jim.

I'll also have another local character as just a memory, certainly for the next few years, as I doubt that we'll be seeing George Prodoumou much in the immediate future, as he has just been warned off for several years. That's a shame, because there's a lot of Jolly Jim in George, albeit obviously a Greek version. He trained up the other side of Thetford, just off the A11, and would bring his string down to Newmarket to work them (as shown here as he inspects a couple of his horses who have just disembarked from the horsebox at the Links early last month, prior to working along the Cambridge Road AW, I would imagine). George only ever had a handful of ordinary horses, but he knows his onions and used to get at least his share of winners. He's done particularly well recently with Trip Switch. There's no point in re-examining George's case - and there's particularly no point in my doing so, because I know nothing more than what I've read in the papers. George seems to have done wrong and now he is serving his time, and the situation is no more or less complicated than that. George might very well be the rogue which his sentence implies - but, if so, like Jolly Jim he is a very likable one. And I don't think that you'd have to go very far to find worse rogues than he.

On a happier note, I see that a very unfashionable jockey James Banks got off the Cold List today. James has been hampered by only having become a professional jockey relatively late in life, so he was a senior jockey ineligible for conditional jockeys' races from the outset; and that, if nobody knows who you are, makes life difficult. However, one thing which James can do, and has always been able to do, is ride very, very well. He is a reminder of how very, very competitive race-riding is: James (formerly of this parish, his father Martin having been head lad for Paul Howling at Moulton Paddocks for many years) is perfectly good enough to win any race on which he happens to be on the best horse, but he only finds himself on the best horse about once a year, if he's lucky. I'll have to watch the replay of his win today (3.30 Leicester) because I'm told that he gave the horse (Chapel House - form P4FU - 4th favourite in a 7-runner race) a very good ride. He started today on the Cold List having gone 46 rides and 288 days since his last winner - but now he's off it, and will stay off it for quite a while because it will probably take him at least six months to have the 30 rides necessary to get back on the list. Or, if one of his next 30 rides happens to win, he'll stay off it for even longer. Yesterday saw some really deserving winners in the Godolphin stable staff awards, but it's worth reflecting that yesterday's winners aren't necessarily the "unsung heroes" of the sport - compared to an obscure jockey such as James, someone like the excellent Clifford Baker could be viewed as a household name! Let's hope, though, that James' success today brings him a small amount of recognition and that he finds that success does indeed breed success. If opportunities do come knocking on his door less infrequently henceforth, that would be no less than he deserves.

Blue sky sulking

It's been a relatively quiet Saturday, but there's no harm in that. I was thinking just now that you know that you're getting old (and over-worked) when you're sitting alone at the dining room table at 7.30 on a Saturday night working through the accounts, but there you go. So I might as well follow that social highlight up with a brief chapter here. Anyway, this morning was glorious: a slight frost, but when the sun got up, it found itself getting up into a cloudless sky. It soon warmed up - but then mid-morning saw clouds materializing, which wasn't so nice as it kept it cold. Still, we've certainly moved on seemingly months in the past fortnight, bearing in mind that it's only two weeks since the temperature got down to minus 16. Which is all the more remarkable bearing in mind that I note that on Thursday afternoon we hit a high of 18. Amazing, isn't it: minus 16 to plus 18 within 12 days? Anyway, here are a couple of shots of the best time of the day, which was between 9.00 and 10.00. The Flat seen beyond the Cambridge Road AW, as viewed between Ruby's ears; and then Karma Chameleon and Ethics Girl having a pick, courtesy of Terri and Hugh, after their exercise; a pick of something which, if this lovely spring-like weather keeps up, will soon be grass. It's good to get a photo of Ethics in as her corpulence is a constant source of bewilderment and amusement. She's such a little porker that she always looks very round, but it doesn't mean that she's fat: she must just have big (albeit short) bones. And, anyway, I was very pleased to have my first viewing of Frankel of the year when I got to the top of Long Hill AW on Thursday morning (which itself was good as Kadouchski had gone up there so relaxedly that I knew that he was ready to run very well) and I was amused/taken aback to see that the best horse/second best horse (delete as applicable) in the world is currently even fatter than she is. So that's good.

Anyway, just a couple of observations from today's racing. Firstly, the salutations go to the connections of Junoob. This is the Haafhd horse with whom Amy Weaver did so well, buying him for 3,500 out of John Dunlop's stable in October, winning two claimers with him and then having him claimed for something like 12,000 only six weeks after his arrival. Her association with him was clearly a profitable one, but it turns out that I was wrong to have asserted at the time that she had got the best of both parts of the transaction: owner Alan Solomons and trainer Tom Dascombe are to be congratulated on his impressive Listed victory at Lingfield Park today, having clearly bought extremely well (just as Amy had done). On a less congratulatory note, I feel that it's worth remarking on the Racing Post's childishness. As we know, the day's main meeting always occupies the centre spread of the Post. Well, nearly always: today we had Newcastle (total prize money 84,000, no Graded or Listed races on the programme) taking prime position with Kempton (total prize money 189,000, three Grade Two races and one Grade Three whose total prize was worth more than the entire card at Newcastle) relegated to one of the lesser slots. Was this an unintentional oversight? Well, I suspect that it was deliberate. You see, today was for 20 years or more Racing Post Chase Day at Kempton. This year it seems that the Racing Post had decided no longer to sponsor the feature race - and, it transpires, the paper's new rival, Racing Plus, stepped into the breach to sponsor the feature race (which you'd hardly know existed now, from the lack of coverage which it received through the week in the Post) plus the Grade Two Pendil Novices' Chase, plus a handicap hurdle. This, surely, must have been the catalyst for the Post's bizarre layout today. If so, whoever within the paper's hierarchy decided upon this petty move deserves a good kick up the bum - or at least to be put in the same category of pettiness as Huntingdon's food-and-beverages-consumption commissar. The Post clearly feels that Racing Plus is competition - but the correct way to react to competition is to act professionally and with dignity, carry on doing what you are doing and, if possible, raise your game. It is not to act in this sulky manner. Kempton, its sponsors and the Racing Post's readership deserved better than to have such an excellent meeting denigrated by racing's principal newspaper. Oh, and by the way, once I realised what the Post was up to, I went back into town and bought a Racing Plus. It's a good paper and it includes editorial by both James Willoughby and Nick Luck, which really means that it has become obligatory Saturday reading henceforth.

A very nice day

From the way they've been doing things at home, you'd never guess that, racing on consecutive days off almost exactly the same rating, Kadouchski would go very close at a Grade One track while Dr Darcey would make no show at probably a Grade Three track. But, as Dean and his friends would say, that's why they call it horseracing. Kadouchski, as you'll probably have deduced from that opening, ran a terrific race at Sandown today. That, allied to another very clement afternoon, made for a lovely outing. The balminess probably, though, wasn't ideal: Kadou's two course and distance wins (including in this race last year) had come on heavy tracks, which really bring his stamina into play, while today's race, with the ground close to good, wasn't able to play quite so much to his strengths. How he'd have fared if the weather had been wet earlier in the week is pure conjecture, but that's by the by: we can't complain as he ran a terrific and terrificly genuine race (again) to finish a good third. He was aided in this by a very sound ride from Joe Akehurst, who did exactly as asked and gave the horse the perfect trip, designed to do as much as we could do offset the disadvantage of the conditions not being as taxing as we'd ideally have chosen. And it was impossible to mind not winning when the race produced the first winner which Nick Gifford has trained since the passing of his legendary, universally-respected and massively popular father. Nick had come extremely close to the winner's enclosure in a valuable steeplechase at Ascot on Saturday and I'd enjoyed shouting at the TV as Tullamore Dew and the badly-underused Liam Treadwell came with a run there, so I certainly wasn't unhappy to see his charge salute the judge today.

Where is Esther Rantzen when you need her?

Well, I'm glad that I didn't allow myself to get too confident before Dr Darcey's trip to Huntingdon, because he posted another very tame effort. I couldn't help myself handing over 20 pounds to a bookie who had him at 33/1, but it transpired that that price, which I'd thought to be hugely over the odds, turned out to be far from generous. He compounded very rapidly once he came under pressure, so the head-scratching goes on with him, I'm afraid. Still, that disappointment aside, it was a really nice outing, thanks largely to the weather. We're only 12 days on from the really cold day when apparently the mercury got down to minus 16 in Newmarket, but I'd say that we must have been around plus 16 today. I heard on the radio today that the warmest February day in British history was in Cambridge in something like 1892, when they recorded (the Fahrenheit equivalent of, presumably) 19.4 degrees - and, although we wouldn't have quite got there today, we wouldn't have been far away. Truly bizarre - but very pleasant too, as the photographs of Dr Darcey cantering to post under William and walking around the parade ring suggest.

The day did have a low point (beside Dr Darcey's run, that is). We fell victim to an idiotic piece of quasi-law-enforcement. There is an owners' and trainers' room on the first floor of the Cromwell Stand, to which Emma, Jason Hathorn and I repaired after our race. As it was such a lovely day and as the room was very crowded, we thought that we would take our paper cups of tea outside onto the balcony once we had removed the tea bag from them. (Sorry, I couldn't resist that last bit: one of my pet hates is ordering a cup of tea and being given a cup of hot water with a tea bag in it). It transpired that the balcony was entirely designated as an area for the disabled so, to avoid being told that we were occupying an area to which we were not entitled, we stepped down onto the south-facing top step of the deserted stand, sat down and enjoyed soaking up the rays while drinking our tea - until, that is, a Health and Safety enforcement officer came up and told us that Health and Safety rules prohibited the drinking of tea from paper cups in that area. She eventually wandered off to harrass someone else who was doing the same thing a bit farther along the step, only to be replaced by one of her colleagues who told us even more forcibly that Health and Safety rules prohibited the drinking of tea from paper cups in that area. For f***'s sake! This was absolutely ludicrous. When I asked this second Hitlerette what the danger was, he said that the objection was that, if we spilt some tea, it would make the area slippery and potentially dangerous for anyone who subsequently came along! He didn't see the funny side of my asking whether the whole area would be cordoned off on rainy days, which would be the obvious and logical extension of that line of thinking. Anyway, by the end of this conversation I'd finished my tea so it became academic, but the whole petty incident was just so bloody stupid. We're all agreed that racecourses ought to be making every effort to make people feel welcome, which is after all pretty much the main thrust of the Racing For Change initiative, but Huntingdon clearly hasn't got the message. Obviously there are instances of behaviour which is anti-social, and instances of behaviour which is dangerous - but no one in his right mind could consider what we were doing either anti-social or dangerous. Leaving aside the fact that jumps races were run at Huntingdon today, which are infinitely more dangerous than drinking tea out of paper cups; and leaving aside that, as Chris Cook tweeted this afternoon "Barely room to turn a horse in the winner's enclosure here at Huntingdon. Matter of time before someone gets kicked" which suggests that, if Huntingdon ought to be concentrating on eliminating potentially dangerous occurences, the drinking of tea from paper cups should not be at the top of the list - the whole incident, insignificant though it was, was just a classic example of making one's customers feel unwelcome. If the two Health and Safety officers who harrassed us are not deemed capable of being told to use their discretion when it comes to identifying dangerous behaviour (or if they really did deem our behaviour to be dangerous) then they should not be employed to do the job. Either way, Huntingdon should hang its head in shame. I've included a photograph of our unacceptable behaviour - and also, to end on a more positive note, a photograph which shows that, while Huntingdon's policy seemed to be to make its visitors feel as unwelcome as possible, at least Gus wasn't fazed - just as long as he can come along for the ride, he's happy.

Don't look back

In this game, as in life, it is inevitable that there are periods when a few things go wrong. In any stable, there are going to be days when things don't go as you'd wish, and I'm afraid that we've had a couple of those days recently. However, in racing as in life, it's as well to look forward instead of back, so we'll look forward - to Huntingdon tomorrow and (the eliminator permitting) to Sandown on Friday. Douchkirk has a couple of entries this week but won't be taking them up (for no serious reason, simply that he had a session with Carol, our invaluable 'back lady', on Tuesday, and following that he is best having a few easy days - so hopefully he'll run in approximately two weeks) but our other entrants are intended runners. So that's Dr Darcey tomorrow and Kadouchski on Friday. They're both in good nick, and are seen here galloping up the Al Bahathri earlier this week, Dr Darcey's rear view and Kadouchski's ears being visible. They both ought to run well, although Dr Darcey's very feeble performance last time and the competitiveness of Kadouchski's race means that, while we might be able to head off to the races with hope, it would be impossible to set off confident of victory.

The connections of Exeter Road's hero (ie Don Cantillon - Don being the connection, not the hero, lest there be any misunderstanding) must have headed out full of confidence, though, yesterday, as the redoubtable La Estrella (who is a gelding, despite the fillyish impression given by his name) took his Southwell record to 11 wins from 11 starts when winning there yesterday as easily as the form book suggested that he would. He's a good horse elsewhere too as his record of something like 18 victories would suggest, but at Southwell - well, it would be wrong to say that he's unbeatable, but he is at least unbeaten, and to be unbeaten after 11 starts is extremely good going whatever the location. Being a 'character', Don Cantillon isn't everyone's cup of tea, but the one thing about which everyone ought to agree is that he is an extremely good trainer, and La Estrella can be regarded as Exhibit A in the presentation of that particular case. He's shown here on a previous visit to Southwell (led by Don and ridden by Dane O'Neill) on an occasion when Ethics Girl was one of those into whose face he kicked the Southwell sand. And you don't put her in her place very easily. Let's hope that La Estrella's latest achievement can inspire the Dr tomorrow.

The write stuff

A couple of results last weekend gave me a lot of pleasure. I really enjoyed watching Restless Harry and Henry Oliver gain a typically gutsy victory in the Grade Two three-mile hurdle at Haydock (the Rendlesham Hurdle, which always used to be run at Kempton on what is now known as Racing Post Chase Day). Restless Harry is one of my favourite horses. He's such a trouper. He dodged a bullet when the failure of the jockeys around him to keep their mounts straight at the last hurdle caused him to suffer a terrible fall at the Cheltenham Festival when he was a novice, but he bounced straight back from that awful incident and keeps bouncing back. He's a credit to his excellent trainer Robin Dickin, and his jockey Henry Oliver rides him with the same bold spirit with which he runs. So that was good - as was the victory of Bourne in the valuable handicap hurdle at Ascot. I'd have liked William and Swincombe Flame win, but they could only finish third; and if they couldn't win, I was very happy to see Bourne salute. I've enjoyed following his progress all the way through. When Clare Lindop was staying with us three years ago, she rode out for Luca Cumani one or two mornings, and he was one of the horses she rode. He was a three-year-old maiden at the time, and I've followed his progress since then. He was a natural horse for us to ear-mark as a potential hurdler at the Horses-In-Training Sale last October, but he didn't take up his place in that. The reason for that is rather a nice one. Bourne was bred and owned by the Chapman family, who have patronized Luca's stable for many years. When Donald McCain and I worked for Luca in the '80s, Donald looked after and regularly rode out a chestnut horse owned by the Chapmans called Main Objective, by the disappointing chestnut Mill Reef stallion Main Reef, in whom I think the Chapmans had a share. Main Objective must have been one of Main Reef's best horses, and won a good handicap at Epsom at the Derby meeting. Anyway, roll on 25 years and Donald made enquiries about Bourne when he saw that he was in the H-I-T sale. The Chapmans, no doubt remembering Donald from all those years ago, responded by saying that if he made a realistic offer, they'd rather sell the horse to him there and then instead of having him go to a sale and the uncertain future that that could mean, because they knew that he would be in good hands if Donald bought him. I thought that that was a lovely story which reflected very well on the Chapmans, and I'm enjoying seeing the horse do well now.

Another of the horses whom we'd earmarked as a potential high-class hurdler won last week, Lyvius winning very easily at Kelso on his National Hunt debut. He was consigned at Tattersalls by Danedream's trainer Peter Schiergen, and boasted decent, but not top-class, form in Germany. I ought to be able to say that I was underbidder to Lyvius, but that would not be strictly true. When Lyvius went through the ring, he was knocked down to the bloodstock agent David Minton while I was trying frantically to attract the attention of the auctioneer and the bid spotters, but was being ignored. It was a true debacle, but in effect did not alter the destination of Lyvius: when I approached David Minton after the sale, he reported that he had bought Lyvius for Trevor Hemmings and that the horse was going to Nicky Henderson, and that his upper limit had been a lot more than he had had to pay for the horse. So my bids not being taken did not alter the identity of the purchaser, merely the sum at which he bought him. That cheered me up a bit, but I was extremely pissed off about the whole debacle - and especially after David Minton said to me, "Yes, I think that you're entitled to feel aggrieved - I saw you trying to bid!". The auctioneer was a man regarded as a very good auctioneer and famed for his snappy turn of phrase, but I was left to reflect that wise cracks from the rostrum are merely the jam on the bread and butter, and if you can't get the bread and butter right - ie if you can't keep your eyes open to notice the bids that are being signalled extremely clearly to you - then the jam is a very poor substitute indeed.

These reflections put me in mind of one of the best newspaper articles I have ever read, in which the great Age journalist Les Carlyon wrote a synopsis of a speech he had made when accepting a journalistic award. I thought that my tale was the auctioneering equivalent of Les Carlyon's point, which was that "the main problems with journalism are technical, not ethical". We're all too used to agonised ethical debates on the problems of modern-day journalism, the balance of freedom of speech set against the right to privacy, and all the shite that the Leveson Inquiry is addressing so earnestly. (For example, I note that two hours ago a story went up on the Guardian website, presumably with a completely straight face, that 'The Leveson inquiry is creating a "chilling atmosphere" towards freedom of expression, Michael Gove has claimed' ...). Anyway, Les Carlyon's point was that such philosophical navel-gazing is of no use whatsoever if the press collectively can't get the basics right (which consistently it can't): "The main troubles with journalism are sloppy writing and sloppy editing, advocacy masquerading as reporting, gossip masquerading as reporting, stories that abound in loose ends and cliches, stories that are half-right, stories that insult the reader's intelligence.". Incorrect grammar, bad spelling, faulty punctuation, factual errors, inconsequential nonsense being treated as serious news - however mighty a juggernaut the Leveson inquiry is becoming, its brief would be massively wider if it were to tackle these more basic problems which reached the stage of an epidemic in British journalism years ago.

And it's not just in print that the English language is so abused on a daily basis. Returning to where we started this chapter, with a review of the racing which I watched on the television on Saturday, I can offer my brahma of the weekend: this phrase was tossed at the viewers on Saturday, "He's got all the right sort of credentials in terms of his abilities". What would be wrong with "He's good enough"? That's like something you'd find in one of those instruction manuals for a Japanese gadget, written by someone who has no familiarity with the English language, no concept of its potential elegance, but who can find his way around a Japanese-English dictionary. You might say, "Look who's talking", especially bearing in mind that I'm sure that I will express myself consistently poorly in the Trainer File which is about to be aired on Racing UK. But, really! The mystery of the moment is why it is becoming increasingly common to watch racing on television and find oneself wondering whether the presenters have English as their first language or their second.

If you would like to read Les Carlyon's words, by the way, you'll find them through this link: http://www.theage.com.au/news/Opinion/The-write-stuff/2005/03/20/1111253883620.html

End of an era

It would be wrong to let today end without remarking on the main news in today's Racing Post: the forthcoming retirement of Richard Hills at the end of a career which has seen him ride many champions and win all the Classics bar the Derby (in which the best he managed was second on Sakhee in 2000, beaten only by Sinndar). 49 is a great age to reach still as a professional jockey, and to do it as Richard as done - ie still riding extremely well - is remarkable. He will hang up his boots after the Dubai World Cup, a race which he won in 1999 on Almutawakel, and will, I hope, enjoy a long and fulfilling, not to mention well-earned, retirement - although I'm sure that he'll find a worthwhile way of filling the time productively. I am aware that those who believe that the great jockeys are those who look particularly "strong" in the final furlong (whatever that means) have never put Richard at the top of their lists, but he's long been at the top of mine. For consistent professionalism and thorough preparation, for tactical acumen and judgement of pace, for well-balanced and sympathetic riding, for all-round level-headedness and decency, and for consistent excellence over a long period, Richard has been hard to top. He'll obviously be best remembered for wearing Sheikh Hamdan's colours (as shown here at Yarmouth last year) but I'll always think of him in the red and white livery of the Premier Cru, for whom he gave Jack Dawson an outstanding ride to win an 18-runner two-mile handicap at Chester one day. I think that Richard retires with a 100% record for this stable as I don't think that he ever rode for us again, but that certainly wasn't for want of effort to book him on my part. In fact, he'd have ridden Ethics Girl at Warwick last September had he not had to leave the track before her race to get to Windsor for Sheikh Hamdan, and I'd always have been more than happy to have him on board any time. The ranks of British jockeys genuinely will be poorer for his absence.

Larry's letter

We didn't, by the way, get to run Frankie at Wincanton on Saturday. He narrowly missed out on getting a start in the divided novices' hurdle. Still, he holds two entries for this week (on Thursday and Friday) so I hope that he should finally be able to run again shortly. We also have Dr Darcey entered at Huntingdon on Thursday in a novices' handicap hurdle and Kadouchski in the conditional jockeys' handicap hurdle at Sandown on Friday which he won last year. Both are intended runners. Peter Hatton rode Kadou last year when he won, and would be the obvious choice this time, but Joe Akehurst will ride; Joe has done a lot of schooling for us this season, rides very well and fully deserves another ride for the stable, to follow the two rides he had on Alcalde in the autumn. With Kadouchski's last four runs all having been in steeplechases, it seemed a good idea to have him schooled over hurdles before the race, just to get his eye back in for the smaller jumps. And I'm very glad that I did: Joe schooled him on this beautifully fresh (but cold) morning up on the Links and, while he jumped very well, he gave the hurdles far too much daylight the first time he went up the line. All was well that ended well, and it didn't take him long to regain the preferred long-and-low hurdling trajectory. These few photographs, reproduced chronologically, illustrate how it went.



Kadou, mind, still has to get into that race on Friday. The legacy, I suppose, of all the recent abandonments, the race has a big entry and he is 34th in order of the 38 entrants. 18 get a run, so we need 16 of the 33 horses ahead of us not to be declared for him to get in. I think that he will, but stranger things have happened. And with Frankie having been eliminated so often recently, elimination certainly won't come as too much of a shock, disappointing though in this particular case (ie when the horse had won the race the previous year) it would be. This, then, brings me nicely on to the topic of elimation. It is one of those things which, unless one is being eliminated, one doesn't really notice that it exists. The paper prints the runners, but it doesn't print a list of the horses who were declared but who aren't in the field - a list which can often be longer than the list of runners. Take, for instance, a 51-65 mile handicap at Kempton on Thursday. I don't know how many were eliminated, but 64 horses were entered and the race had a full field of 14, with the top weight being 9 stone 4lb and the bottom weight being 9 stone; ie, if your horse was rated below 61, he wouldn't have got in. As there is no reason to suppose that there wasn't an even spread of ratings among the entrants along the 51 to 65 spectrum, it seems fair to assume that, alongside the 14 runners, there would have been in excess of 40 horses eliminated from the race. Which is remarkable - but, sadly, not uncommon.


This ties in nicely with the Racing Post's letter of the week (an unofficial award decided by me). This was written by Larry Stratton and was published in today's paper. I hadn't read the article, but apparently the Racing Post a few days ago carried an article saying that it was good that the drop in the size of the British and Irish foal crops has been arrested. Larry's letter pointed out the folly of this assertion. As the one thing about which everyone had been in agreement was that we had a major over-production problem, and that the drop has gone part of the way to addressing this, it is bizarre that the Post should have decided that it's a good thing that such a reduction will not continue. (Almost as bizarre as Howard Wright's criticism in Friday's paper of Newbury for offering free admission to their rescheduled Tote Gold Trophy meeting that day). The reason, supposedly, was that we are apparently in danger of there being not enough horses around to fill the racing programme, a strange and groundless theory which ignores the large amount of yearlings who failed to find buyers at last year's yearling sale (and the number of yearlings who couldn't even get a place in a sale). Let there be no misunderstanding: if we are in sight of there not being enough horses in training to fill the racing programme (which we are not) then this would NOT be because there weren't enough thoroughbreds of racing age alive in the British Isles, but because there weren't enough owners to put them into training. The one thing (even more so than the universal belief that we have had an over-production problem) which unites all of racing's and breeding's participants is the belief that, for the long-term health of the sport, there needs to be a greater financial incentive for owners to put horses into training, and this is a message which we are all trying to get across both to government and to the betting industry. For the Racing Post thus to give the opposite impression, by saying that the problem is going to be lack of horses rather than lack of owners, is at best irresponsible. And Larry did an excellent job in pointing this out.

That's why they call it Lingfield

You will be familiar with the phrase "That's racing". When one just has to shrug one's shoulders and accept that this sport frequently throws the unexpected and the hard-to-swallow (as well as, thankfully, very occasionally the sublime) at one, one just has to take things on the chin, shrug one's shoulders and wryly observe, "That's racing". The classic example came after the 1956 Grand National, which of course will forever remain the oddest thing ever to have happened. After Devon Loch had inexplicably malfunctioned three quarters of the way up the run-in when miles clear and had thus snatched defeat from the jaws of certain victory in the world's greatest race, his jockey Dick Francis must have been shattered. One can see this in the photographs of him walking away, and it's easy to understand. The horse's owner, the Queen Mother, must have been equally devastated. Dick Francis subsequently related that when he was taken up to the Royal Box afterwards, he was at a loss for words and couldn't come up with anything more coherent than a vague, "Your majesty, I'm just so terribly sorry ..." - only to find himself greeted by a kind smile and the words, "Don't worry, Dick - that's racing". One will never find a better example of coping calmly with the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, and that's an example to us all which even Rudyard Kipling would have struggled to better.

Anyway, the point of this all is that my American friend Dean Roethemeier tells me that many of his compatriots, when we would say, "That's racing", say instead, "That's why they call it horseracing". The sentiment clearly is the same, and that's good; but the words actually make no sense at all in the context. And I was reminded of Dean's phrase when I left Lingfield Park yesterday afternoon reflecting, "That's why they call it Lingfield". Regular watchers of this stable might have noted that it is very rare for me to have a runner on the AW track at Lingfield. I have long considered that, of the AW tracks, Wolverhampton is the one where the best horse in the race is most likely to win, while such a thing is least likely to happen at Lingfield. The pattern of racing is forever hard to predict, the tempo is so variable and it such a common occurence that the jockeys get in each others' way and one comes away thinking that, had one run the race six different times, one would have got at least five different winners. Anyway, it was with grave misgivings that I took Karma Chameleon, going for his fifth straight victory, to Lingfield yesterday (and only because there was no suitable race anywhere else this month). The little horse looked (by his own admittedly nondescript standards) terrific and had clearly thrived on the five-week gap between races. It was my pre-race plan and his jockey Shane Kelly's pre-race plan that we be very handy throughout to try to minimize the chances of our being Lingfielded - but that's exactly what we were. 500m from home we were in a hopeless position from which we could not possibly be involved in the finish - and we ended up failing by a rapidly-diminishing neck. It was very pleasing to see him run an absolutely terrific race - and it was very frustrating to be a 'certainty beaten'. Still, we can't sniff at his record for the winter of four wins and two seconds from six starts - and, as we can go back to Wolverhampton on March 8th, we can only hope that that record might be further enhanced before the winter season is out.

And that, of course, as I'm sure that Dean will confirm, is why they call it Lingfield.

Back to the races

We're off to the races tomorrow (Friday). Karma Chameleon (pictured keeping himself on the move during the freeze-up) will try to make it five in a row, but it looks a worryingly competitive race. He's still very well and only 4lb higher than when he last won, but there look to be several very tough nuts to crack in tomorrow's race. He will surely go out and run another highly creditable race, but whether he can win will be another matter. Let's hope he can - but it won't be a disgrace if he can't. We'll see. It'll just be nice to have a runner, with Alcalde, Dr Darcey and Douchkirk all having had their recent engagements frozen/snowed off. Frankie (Douchkirk) might be able to have an outing on Saturday: I'll declare him for a race at Wincanton and, if the race is divided, he'd have a reasonable chance of getting in. If it isn't divided, he'd have virtually no chance of getting in, but it looks as if it will be divided, which generally doesn't happen in jumps races at this time of year, but is happening at present to try to whittle away the backlog of novice hurdlers waiting for a run after so much racing was lost to the weather.

Aside from that, I ought just to salute a few more recent winners. Pride of place, of course, must go to the 11-year-old Dvinsky, formerly of this parish and currently a veteran of 201 starts. Dvinsky, as you'll have noticed, got quite a lot of publicity when he made his 200th racecourse appearance in the middle of last week. Of course the fairytale victory didn't happen - but his fans didn't have to wait long before seeing him back in the winner's enclosure as he won three days later at 25/1, beating the horse who had won his race midweek. Dvinsky must have spent quite a long time here as he's trained by Paul Howling, who only moved away a few months ago back down south (in which part of the world he had started out, but whence he had moved a decade or two ago to come to Newmarket, initially to a small, no-longer-existent, yard on Moulton Paddocks). I didn't know Dvinsky when he was here as the only horse from that stable I could recognise was the lovely white mare Our Kes, but Dvinsky certainly deserves to be recognised. His current statistics are 201-18-30-32, and records don't come much more imposing than that. It was interesting that, when he didn't win on his 200th start, his jockey Tom McLaughlin (pictured, on the left of shot, braving the -14 frozen tundra on the Severals last Saturday morning on one of Ed Dunlop's horses, prior to heading off to ride Dvinsky at Kempton) had opined that he might have won had he been in the first division, which was run at a less frantic pace which would have suited the horse. It was tempting to think that, as Dvinsky hadn't run particularly well, Tom was just saying nice things about the horse - but Tom's nobody's fool, and if he said that, then that was a valid comment, as was reinforced by the horse's 25/1 victory in a less fiercely run race three days later. Tom is a much, much better jockey than his profile would suggest, and this is just one illustration of that fact. Another very good local jockey is Martin Lane, whose talents seem to be becoming more widely recognised this winter, which is good. Martin (pictured on First Pressing on a wet, miserable August afternoon at Chepstow last 'summer') seems to be riding for a broad spectrum of trainers now, and riding winners for plenty of them, and that's nice to see: he's a thoroughly diligent, professional and hard-working jockey as well as a very good one, and any success which he achieves is richly deserved.

A beautiful world

More weather! The temperature was minus 14 at 7.00 this morning which is remarkable. It would still be below zero now (early afternoon - I note that it's minus 6 currently) but it's actually a lovely day. Still as anything, bright sunshine reflecting off the snow, bright blue sky: we really could be in the Alps. It was less cold on Thursday but seemed colder, which was a shame as we had an RUK film crew here to make a Trainer File. They (ie Phil Clarke the cameraman, John McCormack the producer, and Nick Luck the presenter) came out on the Heath and also did some filming in the yard, and it must have presented quite a gloomy sight. It was probably a long cold day for them, but I found it very entertaining, and I'm looking forward to watching the resultant footage on the TV. You'd have thought that a small stable of relatively obscure horses would not provide too much to digest, but we seemed to bang on for hours about all sorts of subjects, including politics (racing and local - not national, fortunately). Anyway, it was a very enjoyable day, despite the gloomy skies. The only disappointment was that Gus, surprisingly, failed to get himself into most of the shots, but he made up for that by worming his way into the affections of our visitors - and in Phil's case he had a willing victim as Phil has a Dalmatian at home, so Gus was preaching to the converted there.

Compare, then, Thursday's grey pictures with the views we've had in the two days since then. It's just been lovely. There's not really a lot to say about two days of normal routine, but I'll whitter on a bit simply to provide enough text to give sufficient space to fit a few photographs in. We've been on Long Hill for cantering and on the Al Bahathri for the faster work, and all seems to be going relatively smoothly. Both canters are coping with the low temperatures well, although at 7.10 this morning the all-weather canter down the side of Railway Land to take one to the start of the Al Bahathri had a crust of frost on its top, even though it wasn't frozen through. This, though, says a lot about the diligence of the Heathmen: Sir Mark's horses had just been down it and back up the Al Bahathri and he had told the Heathman that he thought the down canter was a bit firm, so a tractor went on to it there and then, stopping only to let me and Kadouchski (pictured with our icy whiskers in the post-dawn half-light on our return to the yard) on in front of him. And that was for a canter which I'd have said was perfectly usable anyway. No, we're very lucky to be being taken care of so well. When four of us (Jamie on Dr Darcey, Hannah on Sail Past, Terri on Karma Chameleon and I on Frankie, pictured on our way out, coming off the gallop and finally walking away from it in a cloud of steam) went to the same gallop the following lot, I was delighted to find that we came up the Al Bahathri just after three of Jane Chapple-Hyam's horses, and that that trio contained George Baker riding Secret Asset. George, as we know, is a tremendous jockey and excellent man, and he's just returned a week or so ago from several months on the side-lines, the legacy of a badly broken arm. You'll be aware how big George is, so he'd be the last jockey to welcome an extended spell out of the saddle, but typically his iron will-power has got him back to fitness and down to the right weight. Anyway, I hadn't seen George since his resumption (I hadn't seen him since before his injury, come to that) so it was good to have the opportunity to salute him and to welcome him back. You might spot him in this paragraph's third photograph: I've become a bit detached from the others trottiing off the gallop, but you can spot Jane's trio in front of ours, and Secret Asset is the grey horse in third.

Anyway, George has ridden a winner since his resumption. Those also worthy of salutation include several from this neck of the woods (George, of course, being a Lambourn jockey, notwithstanding the fact that he rides plenty of work here, primarily for Chris Wall). Patriotic won again for Chris Dwyer only the day after I'd just written about him, and then our fellow Exeter Road inmate Charlie McBride had another winner yesterday; while Willie Musson, whose entrance adjoins Charlie's, continues to enjoy a good winter run of form. What's been rather pleasing is that he's been able to use Jamie Mackay (pictured here yesterday, riding across the Bury Road, just ahead of Tim Bailey) quite a lot recently, including on some winners. Jamie's completely fallen out of fashion - well, he did so several years ago, and has never yet been able to re-establish himself - but he's been working harder than I've ever known him of late and is in Willie's all morning, ever morning without fail. So it's good that he's now reaping some reward. He's certainly a very good rider, so let's hope that the tide can continue to flow his way. As it seems at last to be flowing the way of the born-again jockey Dominic Fox (pictured in the pink and black colours at Wolverhampton last month) who is riding out for Roger Varian again (he used to work for Michael Jarvis a few year ago) and has ridden two or three winners for Roger recently. I should just explain, by the way, with these photographs from yesterday and today that we had a good top-up of snow fall during the first half of the night on Thursday so, not that last weekend's snow had really gone anywhere, we have a particularly good blanket of snow covering the place at present. Which explains why, with two lovely sunny days, we've had such lovely views for people, horses and dogs all to enjoy. I see from the forecast that the weather is set to warm up, and that certainly won't be a bad thing from many points of view, including those of those who are wanting to run (or ride) National Hunt horses. We've missed out on opportunities to run Alcalde, Dr Darcey and Frankie over hurdles in the past week which is frustrating, but really that has to come under the wise heading of 'Don't worry about things which are out of your hands': there really is nothing which we can do to affect the weather, and whether race-meetings do or don't take place is something over which we have no control whatsoever. So if they're off, they're off - we just get on with doing the things which can happen, rather than worrying about what's not happening. Things will revert to normal sooner rather than later - but, just for the time being, we've had a fortnight of frost including a week of snow; and, inconvenient and physically uncomfortable that that can at times be, let's just concentrate on the positives: when the snow's on the ground and the sun's in the sky, it's relatively easy to remember that - as the saying goes - for all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it's still a beautiful world.

Planning ahead

Still cold, still snow-covered. No new snow has fallen, but what we've had since Saturday is going nowhere fast. Especially on days such as today when we don't see any sunshine. But it's been a pleasant, straightforward day nonetheless. We had Gina Bryce here again this morning, which was nice. As you may possibly know, Gina is preparing to ride in the Charity Race at the Cheltenham Festival, in which she is due to partner the David Pipe-trained mare On Khee. She's coming here as often as her ATR broadcasting commitments permit, which usually means two or three mornings a week. I try to keep her busy when she's here, as that's why she comes: from the points of view both of fitness and of practice, the more riding she can do between now and the middle of March, the better. So she was here for two lots today and galloped both times, riding Frankie (first photograph) up the Al Bahathri with Dr Darcey and Karma Chameleon and then riding Oscar (Bernadotte) up the same strip with Ruby and Sail Past. Frankie's very straightforward but Oscar (on whom she is pictured in the second photograph, returning last week from a gallop along the Cambridge Road AW) is greener, which isn't a bad thing from her point of view as riding a horse who needs a bit of help is probably more beneficial. Anyway, that's all going well. You might have seen a snippet on the subject on Jason Weaver's and Luke Harvey's 'Get In' show on ATR last Friday evening. Jason had been here filming Gina the previous morning (pictured with the crew in the yard) before going on to film her having some tuition from Richard Perham on the equicizer at the Racing School. Basically, Gina's doing very well and it's a pleasure having her here. We'll all be very excited to see how she gets on in the race - and I'm sure that, if On Khee proves to be the best horse in the race, she'll win it, because Gina won't let her down.

Jason's visit was merely one of two excitements last Thursday. The other was Tattersalls' February Sale. I was involved as both consignor and purchaser - simultaneously, in one case - and that's two nerve-wracking things; but I hope that all has worked out for the best. Time will tell. Anyway, to put it in a nutshell, we were selling Gift Of Silence on behalf of Henry Moskowicz. She's a nice, leggy, immature, unraced three-year-old. I'd always given Henry positive reports about her last season, which was justified as her work was always good. However, we ended up not running her as she just started to find things a bit too much of a strain, simply through immaturity. So she has been given plenty of time to mature in an unpressured way. Unfortunately for Henry, he found himself in a position where it seemed best to sell his racing stock. This was unfortunate both because he was obliged to sell what I think (and had told him) is a nice filly, and also because he was doing so at a time (ie when she was older than two but still unraced) when her value was clearly going to be minimal. It might seem slightly odd my buying her, but I look at it the other way: having consistently given Henry positive reports of the filly, I think it would have been very odd indeed if I HADN'T wanted to buy her. The only pity was that, unsurprisingly, she attracted no interest, so the bid which I made for her was the only one, hence my buying her at an embarrassingly low price. Still, there's a lot more to being a good horse than showing speed in one's early gallops as an unraced two-year-old, and she comes with no guarantee, so it could be that I've just bought a horse who is going to do nothing but cost me money. As ever, time will tell (eventually, as I'm certainly not in any hurry with her and haven't put her back into training yet) - but as of now I'm certainly not unhappy to be the proud owner of a grey daughter of one of my all-time favourite stallions, Cadeaux Genereux. There are two pictures of her in this paragraph, one taken last autumn (walking towards the stalls behind Zarosa for some practice in them) and one taken last week. I think that they probably explain why I'm in no hurry.

Other interest from the sale revolved around the other arrival from it: Simayil. She's rather speculative, but I hope that will prove to have been a good buy. She's been trained by Clive Brittain, for whom she's been running well: she's run four times over the autumn/winter and has run to a Postmark over 80 each time, including when winning over 10 furlongs at Lingfield before Christmas. She's a four-year-old now, but is still very lightly-raced and not particularly mature-looking (pictured), so I hope that she has scope for further improvement. Physically and mentally she seems a tough, hardy horse (if you notice, by the way, a lump on her knee, don't worry as that's just a superficial wound from when she apparently fell over a couple of weeks before the sale, and which is healing well) which is probably the main thing, so we'll just have to see whether she can indeed continue to progress. She's a winner by a very popular stallion (Oasis Dream) so, fingers crossed, ought to hold her value well enough anyway; and if she can better her achievements, so much the better. Again, time will tell - and, again, it will tell slowly, because again I'm in no hurry. She's been working hard enough in the recent past, so I'm not going to ask her to do too much in the immediate future. It's just nice to have her, and I'm looking forward to her becoming part of the furniture here. I'm sure that she'll enjoy fitting in nicely.

Coping with the conditions

It's still only early in the evening and has only been dark for a couple of hours, yet it is already minus 5. So we'll need to be on the ball tomorrow. It didn't really get below freezing last night, but there wasn't much of a thaw so it couldn't have been significantly above it either - and I don't think that it then got above zero during the day. But we had quite a lot of sunshine (as you can see) which melted quite a lot of ice where it hit. So that's some nice smooth-lying water waiting to be re-frozen, just as one would do if one were constructing a skating rink. So we'll have to pick our way even more carefully tomorrow than we have over the past couple of days. Still, these cold temperatures come from clear skies, so no doubt there'll be further scope for some spectacular photographs. And the further benefit is that Gus seems to enjoy playing in the snow; and of course he and his two friends don't need to have their feet towelled clean before coming back into the house, as their paws contain ice but no mud. So that's one thing less to worry about. What's also good is that the Al Bahathri will be open tomorrow (as it was today but wasn't yesterday). We'll take some of them up there, and keep the others to Long Hill. Some of the horses who were spelling in the first half of the winter have still just been walking and trotting, but I think that as of tomorrow they can all canter. It's best not to let them get too fresh at any time, as freshness and accidents go hand in hand, but particularly when it's slippery underfoot. And, of course, they aren't taking much out of themselves in the field at present: the ones in serious training aren't even going out as it's just like the surface of the moon, and the ones who do go out just pick their way tentatively rather than frolic. So we'll make sure that they get 24 hours' worth of exercise each day during their rides. Fingers crossed, that'll keep us both safe and warm.

Today's outlook

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.