Pleasant trips

Gus has a new favourite racecourse, and I think that Anthony was pretty impressed with it too: yes, we had a lovely trip to Epsom yesterday. Easily the most summery day of the week, yesterday peaked in the evening, during which Epsom was bathed in progressively warmer and brighter sunshine. That alone is the recipe for a pleasant trip, because Epsom, the racecourse and the Downs, is so special that, combined with nice weather, any visit there is a treat. And Hotfoot ran well to top it off. Granted, third isn't necessarily a tremendous achievement in a five-runner race, but it was the first time that she'd made the frame, and a massive improvement on her most recent outing, which had been dismal. And she hit the line strongly - and when they do that, one can generally go home happy. Having arrived there in good time, Anthony and I treated ourselves to an extensive walk with Gus (although probably not as extensive as Hannah's walk, because I'm presuming that she covered the full circuit, an option which we eschewed in favour of a more meandering stroll). Gus is great at the races because he never strays too far, being less confident of his surroundings than he is at home (where he is only obedient when he wants to be, which isn't really obedience at all, rather the fortunate coincidence of his wish and mine being temporarily the same). So that was all very pleasant, as I hope that these photographs (which mostly give an unrealistic cloudy impression of the evening, because the best of the sunshine had not yet arrived by the time we had our walk or by the time Hotfoot contested the opener - but the final picture, of Kieren Fallon and Kirsty Milczarek coming back in after finishing first and third in the third race for Saeed bin Suroor and Clive Brittain respectively, perfectly sums up the idyllic summer's evening). And the evening's icing on the cake for me was that I had a real stroke of luck. On attempting to make a phone call about ten minutes after Hotfoot's race, I discovered that my phone was not in my pocket. Well, it's bad enough when one's lost one's phone at home; but on a racecourse? 1,000/1 against ever to see it again, surely. I wracked my brains, and then tried the only long-shot I could think of: I returned to the starter's car, in which I had travelled to and from the start of Hotfoot's race - and there the phone was, lying on the back seat just where I had been sitting, and where it had presumably become dislodged from my pocket during the journey. You can imagine how relieved I was to be reunited with it, as we have all become so dependent on our mobile phones (not least for the fact that I am one of the ill-advised majority who no longer maintains a written telephone directory, instead merely storing all my numbers in the phone).

So that's good: we've had two runners this week and they have both finished third, so we just have to hope that the remaining two can follow suit and likewise acquit themselves with credit. Both Ethics Girl (Goodwood tomorrow) and Silken Thoughts (Newbury Sunday) have drawn well (they'll both jump from stall two) so that's a start - now all Ethics needs is a very strongly-run race and a lot of luck in an 18-runner field, and all Silken Thoughts needs is everything to go right - and we could have another two creditable performances to top off the week. (Note that that is the Racing Calendar's week, which appears to run Monday to Sunday, rather than the more conventional biblical week, which of course runs from Sunday to the seventh day, ie Saturday). So let's hope for the best. I'm looking forward to both outings - how, in particular, could one not look forward to a Group One raceday at the extremely special racecourse at Goodwood? (Even if it is probably unique in being a Group One raceday which contains a Group One race and no other stakes races). Anthony won't be going as he's headed home, but Gus will be accompanying us, of course, just to make sure that we're doing our best with the omens. I think that Gus would be happy to go to the races seven days a week, but Anthony would probably find that one can have too much of a good thing. I'd imagine that Anthony will be back here soon enough, though; and he'll be able then further to fill both Hugh and Gus in on what's new in the world of computer games magazines!

And this chapter's brahma? Provided by the Racing Post, of course. And I don't mean the runners-and-riders' pages, which today informed us that competitors at the minor meetings included the top-class racehorses and stallions Bold Bidder (sire of two Kentucky Derby winners) and Hot Spark, as well as the Coronation Cup winner Dean Swift and the Melbourne Cup winner Even Stevens (who ran against Bold Bidder, surprisingly enough). No, the brahma came in the report of my day at the Hatchfield Farm appeal. I'd conducted a little survey with the assistance of some of the town's trainers and their head lads, the result of which was that, taking the traffic diaries of three stables (this one, James Fanshawe's and Roger Varian's), one had found that these three stables were able to report 16 'dangerous occurences' (good phrase, much beloved by H&S brahmameisters) within a week. I'd faithfully reported this fact to the enquiry -and it inevitably had transformed itself by the time that the paper went to press into ONE STABLE (Roger's) having 16 dangerous occurences in ONE DAY, ie multiplying the frequency of dangerous occurences by 18, and unfairly portraying Roger's string (pictured filing on to the Severals on the Ides of March, funnily enough - and if it can survive that supposedly fateful day, then it can survive anything) as the most hazardous string in the world! I duly apologised to Roger for this brahma, and happily he didn't seem to fazed by it - and quite rightly so, because the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and the stream of winners which he has been sending out all season is more than proof that his stable is far from jinxed.