Days at the races

I enjoyed my trip to Newbury yesterday and part of the reason for that was seeing others enjoying their day too.  It obviously helped that Das Kapital ran well (finishing seventh of 16, which is a good result when your horse is 200/1) but what was so nice was seeing groups of people clearly enjoying the chance to take their positions beside the parade ring rail and watch the horses walk around, before heading off to the stands to watch the race.  Just the usual race-day race-going routine - except that it hasn't been the usual routine for too long in this strangest of years.  Under normal circumstances there's nothing remarkable about seeing people enjoying a day at the races, but yesterday it was a sight for sore eyes.

Of course, we now know that it was a short-lasting sight for sore eyes.  As of today, much larger areas of England are being put into Tier 3, and that includes many racecourses which have hitherto been in Tier 2, which has meant that over the past two weeks they have been able to welcome a limited number of racegoers.  As of Saturday, though, that 'privilege' will be rescinded for most of the tracks which have feature meetings coming up, eg Ascot, Kempton, Newbury, Sandown.  I don't know (but ought to do so) whether Gloucestershire has gone into Tier 3.  My guess is that it hasn't so that a small amount of people will be able to go to Cheltenham on New Year's Day, but nothing can be taken for granted.

That was Newbury's first day of being able to accept racegoers since early March, and it's now clear that it'll be a while before they can do so again.  Financially it was no boon for them - I had a long chat with Keith Ottesen, Newbury's extremely efficient and conscientious clerk of the course, and he confirmed what I had surmised, ie that the cost of implementing and staffing the necessary protocols swallow up pretty much all the income generated by such a limited number of racegoers, particularly as, with London having been put into Tier 3 as of that day, they had had to contact quite a lot of those who had booked tickets to tell them that the couldn't come and that their money was being refunded - but it was just a boost for their morale to see patrons enjoying a day at the races once again.  All round, it was great to see.

Das Kapital's run was very pleasing, although I wouldn't go overboard about it.  It was a decent step in the right direction, but it wasn't a massive leap.  Seventh of 16, with the ones behind him well strung out, sounds very good for a 200/1 shot, but that bare fact is slightly misleading.  The majority of the runners were, like him, no-hopers, and he just ran better than most of those, rather than better than any of the horses with even a slight chance.  There were basically five horses in the betting and 11 no-hopers, and four of the five horses with a chance filled the first four places, 17 lengths clear of the fifth horse; while the other horse with a chance, the 11/2 shot Frankeur, was completely tailed off but did so much wrong in the race (including doing a 360-degree turn once the race was underway, which one doesn't see very often - and one particularly doesn't often see it without the jockey falling off, so plaudits to Harry Skelton) that one can handicap the race as if he didn't take part.

But, overall, it was very good to see Das Kapital keep going at the end rather than weaken in the final half-mile, as he had done in his two previous races; and jump well throughout rather than until he got tired, as had been the case previously.  He jumped well, he tried hard and he kept going - and that's everything you want in a jumper.  But, overall, I have to make sure that I temper my enthusiasm by reminding myself that he was beaten 35 lengths by a winner who hardly came off the bridle, and ran to a Postmark of only 82 (which is 12 pounds more than the figure which he was judged to have run to on his previous race at Huntingdon).  Whatever - low-grade handicaps beckon, and he won't be 200/1 in one of those.

Our next trip is to Wolverhampton on Saturday.  I'm looking forward to that one too.  Any horse's debut is an exciting day and, while this won't be her debut, it'll be Turn Of Phrase's first run for this stable, having had a couple of runs for James Tate prior to coming here a few weeks ago.  It's pretty much guesswork until you run them (albeit educated guesswork) (and it is, of course, still pretty much guesswork thereafter, albeit a bit less so) so any horse's first run (for you) is always a leap into the unknown which you take with optimism and excitement.  She showed a glimmer of ability over seven furlongs for James on her debut before running very poorly over a mile second time out, so it makes sense to run her in a seven-furlong maiden race and hope for the best.  I hope she (shown leading the string under Jana this morning in the final two photographs) won't be disgraced, and I am reasonably optimistic that she won't be.