I shouldn't really be blogging just now. Not just because it's getting on towards 9pm and normal people ought really to find something less weird to be doing at such a time on a Sunday evening. No, the main reason why I should be more purposely employed just now is that my two deadlines for the week (for my Winning Post column and for the 'Grey Panel' Stallion of the Week on
http://www.thoroughbredinternet.com/) are both close of play on Tuesday; and as I can't, for obvious reasons, start writing these articles until the weekend's racing has taken place, my extra-curricular hours in the first three days of the week are thus fairly well accounted for. (Not to mention that, since the election, I have a council meeting three Monday evenings in four). It shouldn't actually take too long to write the 3,000 words of these articles, but the problem isn't the writing of 3,000 words per se; it is making sure that I write the right 3,000 words, rather than 3,000 words of nonsense (or sh*t as one would say if one were paraphrasing 'The Wall'). I can get away with that on the blog, but not in less informal publications. Which is all a fairly roundabout way of saying that I'd better make this chapter fairly brief - but I did just feel that I ought to mark the Eclipse win of the mighty So You Think, who we can presume walked away from his victory yesterday less dejected than he looked (pictured) after having his colours lowered at Royal Ascot by Rewilding.
Wasn't it terrific? I am ashamed to admit that I thought that Workforce would win, but I'm very happy to have been proved wrong. From the point of view of my XII to Follow list it was academic as they are both in it, but it was just lovely to watch two world-class horses giving their all. That was a race which we shall remember for a long time. More forgettable, perhaps is the fact that So You Think was not the only Australian Group One winner running in the UK yesterday, although the other one got less than 1% of the publicity which the dual Cox Plate winner's Eclipse Stakes challenge received. I was very pleased to spot Kidnapped (the 2010 South Australian Derby winner who is pictured here having crossed the Bury Road by Lord Derby's Gap, ridden by John Driscoll) on the Heath a couple of weeks ago
because most of the Australian stars who have joined Godolphin seem to have disappeared off the face of the earth, so it was good to know that he's still alive. Well, he was yesterday anyway, when he finished 15th of 17 behind the Hugh Bowman-ridden Halicarnassus in the Old Newton Cup at Haydock Park. It was good to keep an eye on the racing at Haydock, not least because one of my favourite horses was running: the Doyen filly Fork Handles, whose name is right up there with my other favourites Miss Diagnosis and Whey Sauce. Fork Handles, unsurprisingly, didn't cut much ice, but even so I found plenty of interest in the Lancashire Oaks: the winner Gertrude Bell (named, I believe, after a relative of Lord Derby, which is rather ironic) is owned by my fellow Newmarket town councillor Rachel Hood, the runner-up Vita Nova benefitted from the tremendous horsemanship of Tom Queally, who coped admirably with the costly oversight which had seen her sent out without a breast-girth, while third place was taken by a filly I really like, the Lucy Wadham-trained Dorcas Lane (pictured here ridden by my long-standing friend Ray McGhin).
So that was Saturday afternoon. Saturday morning was very good too, particularly as we've been having some lovely weather (not that you would know it from these photographs, as the sun didn't come out until 8.30). Monday was a cracking 32 degrees and, while the weekend hasn't been that hot, it has still been very pleasant. One of the highlights of the morning was letting a couple of the two-year-olds do their first bit of faster work, but the first highlight is shown here: William Kennedy, who paid us a visit along with his nephew Jamie, giving some of the horses a jumping lesson. None of these
lessons will pay immediate dividends as we don't have any jumpers lined up to run in the near future, but I hope that at some point down the line the lessons which the horses received from him might prove to have been worthwhile ones. Frankie (pictured firstly under William jumping on his own, and then under Sara in company with the William-ridden Asterisk) and Asterisk both jumped small obstacles for the first time, and Kadouchski jumped steeplechase fences for the first time. And all went very well indeed. I know that I've said on numerous previous occasions that we are very lucky to benefit from regular doses of William's diligent expertise, but it's worth repeating: we are very lucky to benefit from regular doses of William's diligent expertise.
I shouldn't really be blogging just now. Not just because it's getting on towards 9pm and normal people ought really to find something less weird to be doing at such a time on a Sunday evening. No, the main reason why I should be more purposely employed just now is that my two deadlines for the week (for my Winning Post column and for the 'Grey Panel' Stallion of the Week on http://www.thoroughbredinternet.com/) are both close of play on Tuesday; and as I can't, for obvious reasons, start writing these articles until the weekend's racing has taken place, my extra-curricular hours in the first three days of the week are thus fairly well accounted for. (Not to mention that, since the election, I have a council meeting three Monday evenings in four). It shouldn't actually take too long to write the 3,000 words of these articles, but the problem isn't the writing of 3,000 words per se; it is making sure that I write the right 3,000 words, rather than 3,000 words of nonsense (or sh*t as one would say if one were paraphrasing 'The Wall'). I can get away with that on the blog, but not in less informal publications. Which is all a fairly roundabout way of saying that I'd better make this chapter fairly brief - but I did just feel that I ought to mark the Eclipse win of the mighty So You Think, who we can presume walked away from his victory yesterday less dejected than he looked (pictured) after having his colours lowered at Royal Ascot by Rewilding.
Wasn't it terrific? I am ashamed to admit that I thought that Workforce would win, but I'm very happy to have been proved wrong. From the point of view of my XII to Follow list it was academic as they are both in it, but it was just lovely to watch two world-class horses giving their all. That was a race which we shall remember for a long time. More forgettable, perhaps is the fact that So You Think was not the only Australian Group One winner running in the UK yesterday, although the other one got less than 1% of the publicity which the dual Cox Plate winner's Eclipse Stakes challenge received. I was very pleased to spot Kidnapped (the 2010 South Australian Derby winner who is pictured here having crossed the Bury Road by Lord Derby's Gap, ridden by John Driscoll) on the Heath a couple of weeks ago 
because most of the Australian stars who have joined Godolphin seem to have disappeared off the face of the earth, so it was good to know that he's still alive. Well, he was yesterday anyway, when he finished 15th of 17 behind the Hugh Bowman-ridden Halicarnassus in the Old Newton Cup at Haydock Park. It was good to keep an eye on the racing at Haydock, not least because one of my favourite horses was running: the Doyen filly Fork Handles, whose name is right up there with my other favourites Miss Diagnosis and Whey Sauce. Fork Handles, unsurprisingly, didn't cut much ice, but even so I found plenty of interest in the Lancashire Oaks: the winner Gertrude Bell (named, I believe, after a relative of Lord Derby, which is rather ironic) is owned by my fellow Newmarket town councillor Rachel Hood, the runner-up Vita Nova benefitted from the tremendous horsemanship of Tom Queally, who coped admirably with the costly oversight which had seen her sent out without a breast-girth, while third place was taken by a filly I really like, the Lucy Wadham-trained Dorcas Lane (pictured here ridden by my long-standing friend Ray McGhin).
So that was Saturday afternoon. Saturday morning was very good too, particularly as we've been having some lovely weather (not that you would know it from these photographs, as the sun didn't come out until 8.30). Monday was a cracking 32 degrees and, while the weekend hasn't been that hot, it has still been very pleasant. One of the highlights of the morning was letting a couple of the two-year-olds do their first bit of faster work, but the first highlight is shown here: William Kennedy, who paid us a visit along with his nephew Jamie, giving some of the horses a jumping lesson. None of these 
lessons will pay immediate dividends as we don't have any jumpers lined up to run in the near future, but I hope that at some point down the line the lessons which the horses received from him might prove to have been worthwhile ones. Frankie (pictured firstly under William jumping on his own, and then under Sara in company with the William-ridden Asterisk) and Asterisk both jumped small obstacles for the first time, and Kadouchski jumped steeplechase fences for the first time. And all went very well indeed. I know that I've said on numerous previous occasions that we are very lucky to benefit from regular doses of William's diligent expertise, but it's worth repeating: we are very lucky to benefit from regular doses of William's diligent expertise.
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