Stuff of dreams

Another too-long absence between chapters.  Thursday last week to Thursday this week.  It's been an odd week.  I've felt a day ahead all the time.  We went to Brighton on Sunday with Roy, so that felt like Monday (as I'm still not really into the mindset of regarding Sunday as a normal racing day, notwithstanding that I always enjoy having the TV on on a Sunday afternoon as other people race their horses).  Then Monday felt like Tuesday.  And then the next couple of days we went to Goodwood and Southwell, with Das Kapital (pictured post-race in the next paragraph) and The Rocket Park.  So it now feels as if the week is already over.  And it's only Thursday.

Roy's trip to Brighton was very enjoyable.  The outing had a lot of publicity as he was going for a fourth win at Brighton of the season and had won so grittily at the 'Festival' on his previous visit, but I wasn't expecting too much.  He's higher in the ratings than he's ever won off and, while he possibly could win off such a mark, he'd need everything to go his way to do so - and in a four-runner race with no obvious front-runner, that was never likely to happen.  The winner Archimento was always the most likely winner in my mind and that's what happened.  We finished fourth (ie last) but it wasn't a bad run.  With Roy, it never is.

Tuesday was pleasing.  I always enjoy visiting Goodwood, just as I always enjoy visiting Brighton.  The difference is that I visit Goodwood considerably less frequently, so going there is always a particularly special occasion.  Das Kapital, although unplaced, did nothing to spoil it.  He wasn't good enough, but in novices' company he never was likely to be.  He ran a nice race, ridden beautifully by Nicola.  He'll be eligible for low-grade handicaps after this, and they will be more suitable for him.  So that was good - and then yesterday was very, very, very, very, very good.

The Rocket Park, formerly known as Sacred Rock except that, after he had spent three years named Sacred Rock and the name had brought him no luck, he became The Rocket Park.  Yesterday morning he was an unraced five-year-old who had arrived here four years ago as a yearling who was, we hoped, going to make his debut the following autumn as a two-year-old.  Now he is a winner!  It was a happy enough day just to get him on the track, bearing in mind that he had spent four years working up to it.  That he won on debut was the stuff of dreams.

Lawrence Wadey has proved time and again that he is as stalwart a friend and rock of support as one could ever find, but even by the accepted highest standards of stalwartness (stalwardity? stalwardedness? stalwartitude?) setting off into the horse's five-year-old season after the two-year-old, three-year-old and four-year-old seasons have all been complete non-events is remarkable.  (And that's not to mention doing so on the basis that "if you find he isn't ready yet, we'll turn him away again and leave him for next year").  I was so very pleased that Lawrence's support, loyalty and faith - to both the horse and to me - was finally being rewarded at least with a runner.  That that runner turned out to be a winner was a dream come true.

So that's been this slightly odd week.  The week will end, of course, on Saturday, but the many people who don't understand the religious calendar (ie that God made the earth in six days and then rested on the seventh - ie the Saturday - and that the rush to get Jesus' body buried in the cave by nightfall was that he was crucified on a Friday and that all had to be done by the end of the day because what was about to follow, the Saturday, was the Sabbath, the day of rest, the seventh day of the week) will maintain wrongly that Sunday is the last day of this week, rather than the first day of next week.

Those people would wrongly say that we have one more runner still to come this week, because our next runner should be White Valiant at Fontwell on Sunday.  William Kennedy was our jockey of choice for many years, and he's a good friend as well as being a highly esteemed colleague and giver of help.  But since he began riding for Donald McCain, it wasn't really feasible for him to come all the way over here just to school the occasional unremarkable hurdler, so the top-class local jockey Jack Quinlan has been our jumps jockey.  It was lovely to have William on The Rocket Park in the bumper yesterday - the icing on the cake, really - but Jack will be on White Valiant on Sunday.

White Valiant is a really frustrating horse as he is an extremely good jumper, but has let himself down badly in his two hurdle races to date simply by approaching his hurdles with the attitude that it didn't really matter if he jumped them cleanly or flattened him.  So irritating, but that's White Valiant: he's very lackadaisical.  But he's been jumping so well for Jack (as, admittedly, he was also doing prior to his previous races).  We've been putting him over the fences as well as the hurdles to try to teach him to be more respectful of the jumps; and we've also put sheepskin cheekpieces on him to try to make him more focussed, more positive, more businesslike, less sloppy.  I hope that he won't let himself (ie us) down again.  We'll find out on Sunday.