An enjoyable weekend

Our July Cup Day wish list didn't quite come off, but I'm happy enough with the day - more than happy enough, in fact - thanks to dear Ethics Girl recording a splendidly brave victory at Chepstow. And the icing on the cake was to hear on Saturday that Takeover Target is going to be fine to live a long and happy retirement. The news of his injury was so subduing, but now we can relax in the knowledge that he's reached the end of a long and very honourable career and can be demobbed in one piece, safe to enjoy the retirement that he has earned. It was obviously a very fortunate day for Joe when Takeover Target came into his life, but the day was a very happy one for the horse too: otherwise the future might not have been very bright for him, but as it is he has spent the years since then living and being treated like a king, and it's lovely to think that they have years more of delighting each other's company. Any other end to his career but a safe one would have been just too awful. So, all in all, a very good day - and Scenic Blast will bounce back: it's only 12th July and he's already won three Group Ones this year, so the fact that he didn't run his race on Friday isn't the end of the world.

Ethics Girl's win was great. In fact, it was a lovely evening all round. I hadn't really paid too much attention to the rest of the card: we were in the last race and I knew that we'd want to stay over rather than come afterwards (she got quite worked up coming home from Redcar so, being in the 9.10 race at a course 200 miles from home, it was an easy decision to spend the night there and not leave until early Saturday morning, by which time all the adrenaline would have dispersed from her system) so it was just a case of us heading down on our own and minding our own business, rather than trying to tie in the transport with anyone else. I was stunned, therefore, when we drove into the box park and the first person we saw was our neighbour Don Cantillon, looking pretty much as shown here. I turned to Hugh: "What the hell is he doing here?", to which he gave the obvious reply, "He's got a runner in the first". We couldn't have shared transport anyway as Don was clearly going to head home afterwards while we definitely weren't, but even so I shouldn't have been as taken aback to see him as I was.

As Don's horse Sir Boss was in the first race, I decided to head up to the enclosures to see that, which decision was the catalyst for Brahma of the Night. Sir Boss wasn't the only interesting horse in the race, because it also contained our former inmate Picot De Say, plus Bert's Memory who is the son of a dear mare whom I used to train (Meg's Memory). It turned out rather nicely as they filled the trifecta (Sir Boss - Picot De Say - Bert's Memory). At this early stage of the evening I was, naturally, dressed similarly to the get-up Don is sporting in this photograph, but I thought, our race not being for more than two hours, that I'd just wander up as I was, keeping well out of the way, to have a look at the horses and watch the race. As I left our truck, it was starting to spit with rain, so I put my sports jacket on over my T-shirt and shorts, making myself look no less scruffy but, if possible, even sillier. So I skulked thus attired up the hill to stand on the rails just below the parade ring, where I had a good view of the horses as they went to post (as the pictures of Sir Boss, above, and Picot De Say, below, show) and then as they finished the race. Beforehand, though, Luke Harvey (who was presenting for ATR) and his cameraman passed me, and Luke gave me a cheery greeting with a particularly amused grin on his face. I should have smelled a rat, but I didn't, and thought nothing of it - until an hour or so later, when speaking to Emma on the telephone, she told me that I'd featured as the focus of attention on ATR in the 'worst dressed' category, which no doubt Luke would have found extremely funny. As I apparently have "no sense of personal vanity", even I was able to see the funny side of it, but if ever ATR decided to employ James Sherwood as its fashion czar I'm sure that he would have had some choice words to say!

So it was nice that Don's horse won, thus vindicating the adage of backing the first trainer one sees. And what was also nice was that the second trainer we saw was Stuart Kittow, next to whose box we had parked, and that his horse, Sir Ike, also won. It had been like this up at Carlise, when we'd bumped into another long-standing acquaintance, my fellow Hawick native Bruce McTaggart, and he'd had a winner, so the evening was going well even before Ethics Girl's win - which, of course, topped everything off really well, the filly doing everything right and Alan Munro giving her a typically flawless ride. Under normal circumstances one would like to cheer for a royal winner, but this time I was so pleased to see our filly prevail, notwithstanding the fact that Prince Charles was the owner of the head runner-up. We'd gone up to Carlisle and the race hadn't gone according to plan at all, resulting in us being beaten a head with daylight back to the third; so this time, with the jockey doing everything right, it was very, very pleasing that, of the leading pair which had drawn well clear of the rest, it should be Ethics Girl who had her head marginally in front as they passed the post. Things don't often go perfectly, but when they do it's great!

Any weekend which begins with a winner is likely to be a good one, and this one has indeed been very pleasant. Two things stick out. Firstly we enjoyed a very pleasant dinner yesterday evening in 'The Lancer', an Indian restaurant in the High Street. We have bade farewell - it's very much 'au revoir' I trust, as I think and hope that she'll very much stay on the radar - to Martha, who is now going to do what all young people should do, ie travel. She's off to Toronto, which should be great experience for her, and yesterday evening she had her send-off. As this send-off ended in the early (or not particularly early) hours of the morning, I didn't take part in all of it, but it started with dinner in 'The Lancer', and that was very nice indeed.

Similarly pleasant was today's Ramble, which was a very tame post-script to the Dunwoody-inspired walkfest. This featured a few people and dogs tramping around the Town Plate Course on the National Stud, finishing up the Rowley Mile (pictured) rather than the July Course, and then crossing the Heath back to where we'd started. It was supposedly led by the Newmarket Trainers' Federation, and luckily a few of us did take part, others being Mark Tompkins, Chris Wall, Michael Stoute, William Jarvis and Julia Feilden. The weather was ideal - dry and warm but not hot, and with a breeze - so it proved to be a very enjoyable ramble. It wore Stan and Bean out, and I'll sleep well tonight too. But then I generally do.