​I intended yesterday evening to listen to the Arsenal-Barcelona match on the radio. No, I do not have access to satellite television. Forgetting personal important matters I have yet to become reduced to, though I do occasionally forget matters I have planned to do. Aide memoires are a help, though I have to remember to write the aide memoires and place them where my eyes focus on the most, the kettle, for instance. 
Yes, I enjoy the female version of football, and I am annoyed with myself for watching the second-half of the Scottish Cup Final for no other reason than finding it listed when searching for the day’s racing results on the B.B.C. CeeFax Red Button service. The upside is that my day today has started with the remarkable news that the Arsenal girls achieved what all the commentators considered to be an impossible task. The result last night should put all the England squad members who play for Arsenal in great form for the upcoming Nations League matches and more importantly the defence of their Euro Championship Trophy. I am happy for me and happy for them.
Odd, is it not, that despite all the millions and billions thrown at the English men’s game, it is the female teams that are delivering the trophies.

What perhaps holds me back as both a punter and a commentator on horse racing is that bias and prejudice affect my judgement. Take Field of Gold, for example. Because I believe Kieran Shoemark to be unfairly treated by the Gosdens, though, I suspect, John Gosden’s actions, contrary to the narrative that they had Shoemark’s back, was perhaps orchestrated by what some of Clarehaven’s more influential clients were saying privately, I did not want Field of Gold to win yesterday’s Irish 2,000 Guineas at the Curragh. I accept that Colin Keane is one of the best jockeys in Europe and his experience of the Curragh was to his distinct advantage when the Gosdens’ were weighing up who should succeed Shoemark, a large part of me still wanted something to go wrong, for Keane to ease down and be nabbed on the line or for the horse to simply not perform. 
I also accept that Field of Gold is a rattling good horse, though whether he is, or will become, the top 3-year-old miler in Europe is of little interest to me. As I have said on many other occasions, only time will tell how potent the of any race will turn out to be. The beaten horses all finished in a bit of a heap, which suggests they may well be much of a muchness. Time will tell, you see. Remember, Frankel looked to be the most impressive classic winner of all-time when he won the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket, yet it turned out he beat a field of donkeys, comparatively speaking.
I really dislike to read about horses that are bigged-up at this time of the year. I just wish the racing media would live in the now and not propel their prophecies long into the future. Only if Field of Gold suffers a training mishap and cannot run again this season will it be likely he will stay in training as a 4-year-old, the age when we can really begin to determine the very good from the 3-year-old shooting stars. It is the single-most aspect of racing that chills my heart against the flat – the speed at which colts are retired to the stallion sheds as that is where the big money is to made. How can comparisons be calculated between the generations when the leading 3-year-olds are whizzed-off to stud?
If I could rule the sport, I would not allow any horse to stand as a stallion until it is 5-years-old as encouragement to owners to keep their horses in training as 4-year-olds. The sport is called horse racing and because of that undeniable truth the racing of horses should have priority over the breeding side of the industry. Whereas National Hunt exists as a pure sporting endeavour, it seems to me that the flat only exists to boost the income of breeders. To me, a cynic, the flat puts the cart before the horse and it is a poorer spectacle because of it.

​Caring about an issue is not the same as knowledge of the issue. I am indebted to a letter by Mr. Mark Albon in the Racing Post today on the subject of the R.o.R. charity, owners’ contributions and how the charity dispenses its grant money.
Since 2023, the year Mr. Albon chooses to use as the centrepiece of his letter, three of the big auction houses now contribute £12 per horse sold by them to R.o.R. Not that this new source of funding diminishes Mr. Albon’s point.
I was not aware that until recently owners contributed £1. 25 per race to R.o.R. and this has now been increased to £3 per race. Mr. Albon might have mentioned that owners were being ‘forced’, his word not mine, to pay an increase to R.o.R. at the same time as the charity will be receiving a huge boost to their funds.
To return to the year 2023. In that year, R.o.R. accounts stated the charity had a little over £4-million, of which £1.3-million came from owners’ contributions. The balance came from the Levy Board. Mr. Albon is not happy by the way R.o.R. funds is dispensed. According to Mr. Albon fifteen charities shared the majority of the grants, with one charity receiving £250,000. Leaving, again according to Mr. Albon, only £50,000 to be shared by other equine charities, many of whom are in desperate need of funding and yet received nothing.
Mr. Albon obviously has an axe to grind, though I do believe this issue should be investigated, if not by the B.H.A., then the Racing Post, as the industry newspaper, should take an interest in the matter. Mr. Albon has his own proposal to remedy the conflict and I will leave readers to go on the Racing Post website to read his letter to form an opinion on whether his ideas for reform are better than the present set-up.
My stance is that equine charities can never have enough funds and this sport should enable that by any way possible. I do not know whether jockeys mandatorily contribute to R.o.R. but I believe they should, if only a small percentage of either their riding fee or prize percentage is taken from them. I just hope there is no malpractice at play here and that going forward R.o.R. will consider helping all the smaller equine charities in this country. If the sport has a social licence for its continued existence, that licence must be doubly important when it comes to the aftercare of racehorses when they are removed from the racing environment.

When Kingman was defeated in the 2,000 Guineas, was his jockey sacked because of it? I believe James Doyle was the jockey that day and every day after the horse won the Irish 2,000 Guineas. Here is my point: Shoemark may, and it is only may as no one can say for sure what might have happened if the horse had been ridden differently, well regret the ride he gave Field of Gold that day, yet the man who will benefit from his mistake, if mistake it was, will be Colin Keane. He will not give Field of Gold a similar ride to the one Shoemark gave him, as indeed Shoemark would not do today at the Curragh, if he had been given a second chance. James Doyle became a great rider after winning the Irish 2,000 Guineas, sadly Shoemark is denied that opportunity.

Hayley Turner is correct. In not having an all-girls team in the Shergar Cup this season a whole lot of the fun of the competition will be squeezed out of it. I am sure I am not the only fan of the Shergar Cup who supported the girls’ team due to them being the ‘underdogs’ and the not so small consideration that some of them were on a better quality of horse than was normal for them. I wonder if Ascot would have taken the same decision if Hayley were still riding?

​In a recent edition of ‘Who Do You Think You Are’, a heavily pregnant Aisling Bea, an Irish female comedian, for the uninitiated, said one of her close relatives, I think it may have been one of her grandmothers, was the first Irish professional female jockey. My ears lit-up at this revelation, as doubtless you would expect. Unfortunately, the topic did not prove part of the programme, so I was left unenlightened. Intrigued, I googled in search of an answer and, of course, was not helped one little bit. ‘Who was Ireland’s first female professional jockey’ was met with I.T. silliness, beginning with Charlotte Brew, then Holly Doyle and then Nina Carberry.
I have now contacted the Horse Racing Ireland and they will be getting back to me soon. In case anyone cares about this wee fact, I will relay the information as soon as possible, not that I can relay it any quicker than that. If you already know the answer to Aisling Bea’s famous ancestor, please keep it to yourself now, please. 

There will be changes to the Epsom Derby meeting but not for two seasons. Why the wait? Because the two people formerly employed by the Jockey Club who were most vocal about the Derby meeting requiring change, have departed for more tranquil waters and no one else in the organisation has yet picked-up the baton. Present thinking on the matter, which stopped when Nevin Truesdale want on his way, is that the Derby and Oaks will be run on consecutive Saturdays, with the Coronation Cup staged on the intervening Wednesday. This will, obviously, be a mistake. The Epsom Derby began its nose-dive to ordinariness amongst the British public when the race was moved from its traditional spot in the calendar, the first Wednesday in June. It may well never again re-establish itself no matter what changes are wrung. But the Epsom Derby should return to its traditional date, if only for the point of experimentation. If it works as a stimulus to the media and the public, then that is a positive. If it fails, then we shall know that more drastic measures are required to save the race from becoming just another race as far as the public is concerned. If the Cheltenham Gold Cup can attract both betting revenue and the gaze of the sporting public on a Friday, then can’t the Epsom Derby be as equally successful with the public and the media when run on a Wednesday?

In today’s Racing Post, Tom George makes a very good point about the race programme for National Hunt in this country being unfit for purpose and that we should be looking to Ireland and France for inspiration. Horse racing, especially over jumps, is first and foremost an equine discipline in the way Three-Day-Evening and Show Jumping is. Betting should only be considered of secondary importance, as important as it is to the financial welfare of the sport. If there is not a programme of races befitting the education and potential of the young horse, we are guilty of putting revenue before welfare and that is a sin for a sport which claims ‘welfare to be of vital importance’. Someone from the B.H.A. should contact Tom George and ask him to put meat on the bones of his complaint and then act on his advice.

​I visited the ‘Find a Racecourse Near Me’ portion of the Great British Racing website yesterday and unsurprisingly my nearest racecourse is Exeter, which is 38-miles from where I live, with the next meeting being held on Thursday October 9th and the lowest ticket price is £15. I can get into Wincanton on the other hand for £11, it is though 78-miles from where I live and the next meeting is on Sunday October 26th. If it were not for my growing aversion for being more than 10-miles from home if in a car or an hour when cycling, I would put the dates in my social calendar. And yes, I do not possess a social calendar, those afflicted with a liking for ante-socialism have no need of one.
As someone who was born cynical, it is easy to criticise the efforts of G.B.R. to promote the sport, especially in age of multiple competing sports and other entertainments all of which are doing all they can to expand their reach, but I thought the first ad was o.k. and the website easy to negotiate. We are not alone in the uphill struggle to remain relevant, French racing is also having steer a way through the doldrums and France Galop has had to sheer 20-millions euros off their prize-money budget.

As expected, the She’s Perfect team were unsuccessful in their appeal against her disqualification in the French 1,000 Guineas.  Personally, I think it was the wrong decision, though I am not surprised the stewards could not bring themselves to take a race off a leading French owner and give it to a loud and lovely syndicate from England. Hopefully Charlie Fellows can return to France with his filly and put the record straight in the French Oaks. If only life would be like that.

With B.H.A. approval there will be a charity race at Newmarket on Saturday September 20th, in aid of Newmarket Housing Trust and Racing Welfare, restricted to trainers located in Newmarket. But no jockeys will be involved. They can stand, watch, criticise and laugh, as the people who they usually ride for, trainers, become jockeys for the day. Such fun!

I remembered a horse Peter Harris used own – he who now has horses trained by Jane Chapple-Hyam – called Bee Sting. He won a couple of bumpers back in the day, trained by Peter Cundall, and was considered the likely next best thing, with Cheltenham options a’plenty. He did not, though, progress as they say and no doubt ended his day as a brilliant hunter. Anyway, the reason his name came to the forefront of my mind was the day before I was stung on the leg, just above where I broke it many moons ago, and as I type that left leg looks like it has been subjected to a pharmaceutical trial of a drug that has been rushed through its laboratory tests. I saw the bee responsible, and it was one of those small, quite cute varieties that give the appearance that honey would not melt in their mouths. And to think I try to have a majority of plants in the garden that are bee-friendly. The bargain is not being kept by the bee side, I suggest, and adds further evidence to my theory that nature dedicated to annoying everyone of us.

​The horse racing industry is worth £4-billion to the British economy. The treasury receives £300-million directly from British Racing, and the industry employs 100,000 people. So why is the British Government doing all it can to drive the racing industry into extinction. As with the blatantly flawed Net Zero zealotry, it is all to do with ideology. The problem they are trying to solve is worthy, I admit, yet horse racing has very little to do with the problem. On-line gambling is where the problem lies, casinos and poker games. Anyone who would like to be better informed on this issue I direct to today’s Racing Post and a piece written by serving M.P. Dan Carden. I have not looked-up which side of the house he sits as I do not want to prejudice myself against him.

Came across what may well have been the first outing of Great British Racing’s ‘The Going Is Good’ campaign yesterday and I was not appalled by the content. Light and fluffy, perhaps, and it made no great claims other than anyone attending a race-meeting is sure to have a memorable time.  That said, Newbury’s Shaun Hinds has proved that the best way to boost attendance is to address the people living in the local post-codes, a marketing campaign that must have cost a fraction of the G.B.R.’s £3.2-million. 

Our repulsive, lying, dictatorial, traitorous and smug Prime Minister, announced in Parliament yesterday, though he did not actually mention it to M.P.’s as I doubt it matters a jot to him, that the upshot of his belly-licking negotiations with the repulsive, lying, corrupt and dictatorial E.U., is that life will soon be easier and less costly to transport horses across the Channel to France. This new freedom of movement for livestock is also very helpful to French trainers as they get caught up in the red tape when returning from a journey to a British racecourse.
And do not applaud either our Prime Minister or the E.U for sorting out this mess as politicians were responsible for it in the first place.

Reform of the Irish novice chase programme, especially the withering of the Beginners’ Chases, is to be applauded. You can have 20 runners in a Beginners’ Chase, though with only a handful in anyway competitive. Get within ten-lengths of a Willie Mullins ‘Cheltenham type’ and you are handicapped out-of-all-proportion to the horse’s true ability. Though as Willie Mullins will also be diverted to novice handicaps, I suspect the problem is being more moved sideways than solved. The Willie Mullins problem is a hard problem to solve, to be sure. If every other trainer in the whole of Ireland cannot solve the Willie problem, what hope does Horse Racing Ireland have?

Outside of equine charities, which I still believe horse racing could do more to help, the racing industry has a great record of helping human charities raise funds. Jane Buick has become the driving force behind the charity ‘Autism in Racing’ and is heading up ‘The Great Big Ride’ event next month to raise awareness and funds. It is a call for people in the sport to get mobile on horse, bike or shank’s pony and, if possible, to send a video of the day to the charity. There is also to be a mini open day in Newmarket for families of an autistic child to tour the stables taking part. I believe the day is to be limited to ten families.
One should never brag about what you do for others, though I do believe the racing industry should make the public more aware of how it looks beyond its own borders when it comes helping human charities.

​I heard one pundit suggest that if Mikhail Barzelona had not dropped his whip in the French 1,000 Guineas he would have certainly won and negated the hoo-ha about the disqualification of She’s Perfect. This is pure supposition as we cannot know whether the filly would have gone forward for use of the whip or twirled her tail in resentment. 
Julian Muscat, writing in the Tuesday column of the Racing Post, whilst giving his thoughts on The Lion In Winter and whether Ryan Moore will choose him over Delacroix, makes reference to Wayne Lorden dropping his whip on Japan in the closing stages of the 2019 Epsom Derby.
There seems to be a given amongst racing commentators, in line with most punters, that the whip, or Pro-Cush as there is a push for us all to call a whip (some of us like to call a spade a spade and a whip a whip) is some sort of go-faster turbo charger. It is an encourager tool, to give it a more accurate definition, whilst also being a safety device when used correctly to keep a horse galloping in a straight line.
During a race, a use of the whip should be akin to the referee of a football match, seen but never heard. The less a jockey uses the whip, the less likely anything will go wrong, to my way of thinking. The whip can so easily get both a jockey and the sport into headline bad news. Too many horses go ‘sour’ due to over reliance of the whip. Frankie Dettori and Ryan Moore use the whip sparingly, as a last resort, and every apprentice should be taught to use the whip in a similar manner.
Some horses resent the whip and curled up when it is used, even sparingly. Honest horses do not need the encouragement of the whip. Horses winning easily do not need the whip to be used. Horses out-of-contention should never have the whip used on them. The whip gets the sport into trouble, as when a jockey pulls the whip from one hand to the other and the horse, especially a 2-year-old or ‘green horse’ rolls away from the whip. Even Ryan Moore cannot be sure how a horse will react when he changes whip hands, as happened with Exactly in the French 1,000 Guineas.
The whip is not a magic wand and it is not an instrument of punishment. Stewards should take into account – and I am referencing the Wexford stewards here – that some horses, especially mares, can be made sour by any use of the whip as encouragement and they should decide on caution when a jockey or trainer of experience and respectable character informs them that the horse in question has an aversion to the whip. I am sure some pundits and most punters would like to see a jockey suspended if they should drop their whip as it prevents them from riding to achieve the best possible placing.

Betfred will give a bonus of £2-million to the owner of any horse that wins the Triple Crown. Obviously, the only owner who stands to win their largess is Godolphin with Ruling Court. When the bonus was announced it was assumed, certainly be me, that only a colt can win this bonus for its owner. But why shouldn’t a filly be allowed to win the Triple Crown. I contest the last winner of the Triple Crown was not Nijinsky but Oh So Sharp when she added the St. Leger to her Oaks and 1,000 Guineas victories. I have heard her achievement referred to as the fillies Triple Crown but why should it be less of an achievement for a filly to win three classics than for a colt to win three classics?
Of course, this year, given Godolphin won both Guineas at Newmarket, with both heading for Epsom, Godolphin should have two bullets to shoot for the Triple Crown bonus, with Desert Flower and Ruling Court.
So, I ask again, why shouldn’t a filly win the Triple Crown and the £2-million bonus?

​Shaun Hinds, chief executive of Newbury racecourse, has proved that if you treat your customers with the reverence and respect that each and every of one of them deserve, great results can be achieved. Attendances have increased both over jumps and on the flat for nearly every meeting since Hinds took control. Once upon a time, when I was but a callow youth, I admit, going racing at Newbury was more akin to a parade inspection at an army barracks. Fun was not acceptable; ‘do as you are told’, the unspoken motto.
As a racecourse, the green bit the horses perform on, I mean, I believe there is not one better in the whole of the country and it deserves the number Group 1’s befitting such a fair and galloping racecourse.

How Journalism kept the Preakness is beyond me. And why no intervention by the stewards? In Britain we outlawed nudge and jostling more than a century ago and yet in the U.S. it seems if jostling and nudging is outlawed, barging and boring is permitted. The Kentucky Derby was run on a track brother to a slurry pit and the Preakness was more a brawl governed by the Queensbury rules and less a fair contest. I am not suggesting that the best horse did not win the race, I am though suggesting his rider was fortunate he did not put another jockey on the ground and in hospital. The more I witness U.S. racing, the less I like it.
Oh, Heart of Honor sort of disgraced himself in the stalls and then ran on to good effect to finish 5th and doubtless paid for his trip there and back.

The Derby trials are more or less done and dusted and I have yet to see a colt to take away my faith in Ruling Court.

The Summer Jumps programme, which started weeks ago, is to have a summer jumps championship starting next weekend at Cartmel. Smells slightly of an idea only recently cobbled together, not that it should be dismissed as bad, even if it is tardy.
I will also say ‘only £30,000’ up for grabs, though any help will be do, as most trainers and owners will counter. The championship is for jockeys, trainers, owners and ‘small trainers’, those who trained less than 30-winners in the 2024/25 season. The best aspect is there are more points up for grabs in bigger field races than with fewer. In 5-runner races, the winner gets 5-points. 6 and 7-runner races the points are 5-pts to the winners and 3-pts to the runners-up. 8 runners or more and it is 10-pts to the winners, 5-pts to the runners-up and 2-pts to the connections of those in third place.
So, good idea, pity it could not be announced for the first meetings of the summer season and the prize-money really should be double or more than is on offer. Cannot think it will do much to aid competitiveness this time around but as a concept it is a step in the right direction.

The Irish stewards are a bunch of half-wits. Let us not bandy about with half-truths. Some of the decisions both racecourse stewards and the H.R.I. are simply ridiculous and threaten to bring the sport in Ireland into disrepute. At Wexford over the weekend Ted Walsh was fined £3,000 after a running and riding enquiry. Ta Na la had finished second to the favourite Aspire Tower, a horse with far better form than the runner-up and subsequently was banned from racing for sixty-days and jockey Shaun O’Callaghan given a 14-day suspension.
Jockey instructions were ‘to settle the mare as she can be very free, get her jumping and to come home the best he can, and not to use his whip’. Given the mare ran as well, if not better, than the form-book suggested would be the case, I can only assume O’Callaghan offence, as instructed by the trainer, was not to use his whip.
Again, kindness is being considered a crime. Again, common-sense in Ireland is blown to the winds. Again, the welfare of the horse is placed second to the expectations of punters. Ted Walsh is guilty of looking after the mare and her owner, nothing else. All he set out to achieve was to make a racehorse out of a mare who seems to be her own worst enemy and in achieving that, he was doing what he is paid to do by the mare’s owner.
The Wexford stewards are right up there now for being the least competent stewards in the whole of Ireland. I can gratulate them and wish them luck in the final.

​John Gosden said of his Lockinge winner Lead Artist that the horse had plenty of stamina as he has already won over 9-furlongs. John Gosden spent his early training years in California where 9-furlong races are indeed spoken of in terms of stamina. In California, I dare say, races over further than 10-furlongs are the equivalent of 2-mile+ races over here.
Flat trainers use the word ‘stamina’ when talking about how far their prize two-year-old might stay when all grown-up and mature, as if they are talking of a potential Ascot Gold Cup winner, rather than the ability of the horse in question to stay seven-furlongs. 
This use of the word ‘stamina’ by flat trainers is annoying. Why will they not adopt the word ‘ability’ when postulating on the furthest distance their horse might be capable of winning at? I fear one day in the future, if horse racing has a long and fruitful future, that trainers will be saying that they are sure their prize horse will have the stamina to stay the speed-requiring distances of six or seven-furlongs. 

Rachael Blackmore continues to be central to our sport, even in retirement. She obviously took everyone by surprise last Monday and it is testament to her place in the sport’s hierarchy that every Racing Post writer is eager to have his or her say on the woman who moved mountains and altered the percentage of prejudice against her sex.
As you would expect, Lee Mottershead’s piece on her is lead by facts and the opinions of the famed and famous in our sport. In fact, and it is no surprise to me, someone who follows the exploits of female riders perhaps a little closer than most, little has changed during the ‘Blackmore Years’. Although more female jockeys are riding now, especially in Britain, the win to ride ratio has hardly altered, and if you took Blackmore’s rides in Ireland out of the equation, I suspect the tide has rolled backwards in her homeland.
Rachael Blackmore was – odd to use the past tense about her – a brilliant jockey, as her career record clearly demonstrates. Her career highs outstrip the achievements of every male jockey who has ever ridden, with the exceptions of the greatest of jockeys, and she is entitled to be in that select band. She did not win the King George at Kempton, yet that is the only ‘classic’ National Hunt race that slipped her grasp. I just hope it cannot be said of her ‘there will never be another like her.’ There has to be or there will not be a Blackmore legacy.

What is required, of course, for there to be another female to follow in the footsteps of Rachael Blackmore is for a trainer or owner to give a female jockey similar opportunities to those given to Rachael.
I am putting Ed Walker on trial when it comes to this subject. No one can say that Hollie Doyle has any need of a Blackmore legacy. She has created her own legacy in the sport. On Saturday, she won on Qilin Queen for Ed Walker. The filly will next be seen in the Epsom Oaks. But will Hollie keep the ride? Husband Tom usually hops into the saddle when Walker has a runner in a big race, when he is not required by William Haggas. Saffie Osborne also rides regularly for Ed Walker.
If trainers and owners do not give opportunities to even our top female riders, and no one can argue that Doyle and Osborne are in the top echelon of riders in this country, what chance is there for the gender-equality playing field to ever become level. Blackmore did not rise to the pinnacle of the sport due to her ability in the saddle, she succeeded because she was given the opportunity to prove herself the equal, and the better in most cases, of her male colleagues. And it does matter if Qilin Queen is 25/1 for the Epsom Oaks, odds which doubtless reflect the likelihood of her winning the race. If Hollie or Saffie cannot be trusted with riding a 25/1 shot, what are the likelihood of trainers turning to them when they have previously ridden a horse that is favourite?

Billy Loughnane is a phenomenon. Only 19 (? They grow up so fast, these days) and he has already ridden a winner at every British racecourse bar 4. It cannot be long before quantity is replaced by quality.

​Sometime today, time-zones confuse me so it may have already happened, Saffie Osborne, in conjunction with her father and comedy partner, Jamie, attempts to become only the second female jockey in U.S. racing history to win a leg of the Triple Crown. Her mount, Heart of Honor, has the most annoying habit any racehorse can have in not liking 1st’s against his name, and preferring to bask in a succession of 2nd’s, which suggests he is either unlucky or does not particularly strain every tissue in the final hundred-yards of a race. Now is the hour Heart of Honor. For Saffie and your country strain every tissue and prove yourself a true warrior. 
I do not follow U.S. racing and apart from viewing a replay of the Kentucky Derby, a race that had more in common with equine mud-wrestling given the underfoot conditions and the mud-pack every horse adorned at the finish, than a classic horse race, I have no insight on the form and quality of the 3-year-old classic crop. If they are an ordinary bunch then Saffie might have an opportunity of attaining the height and glory of Rachael Blackmore. Saffie is a great gal and I have my fingers crossed for her, though crossing my fingers is not going to improve my typing skills. If I left in all the typos I produce, mainly just hitting the i when I intended the o or the h when I was intending to spell gal or glory, for instance, the 200-words thus far would read like a cypher and any reader would need to be a cryptographer to understand my meaning. 
And to think after her first every ride in public Saffie’s mother turned to Jamie and suggested that perhaps race-riding was not for their daughter.

Hewick, along with Monmiral, goes into battle against the best staying hurdlers at Auteuil today. He was a meritorious runner-up in the same race last season and is now 4Ib better off with Losange Blue, though he is also a year older. He is a great little horse and once I know how Saffie gets on in the U.S. I will recross my fingers in hope of Hewick providing Shark Hanlon with more recompense for the injustice done to him by the Irish authorities last year. 

In Sean Magee’s history of Royal Ascot, an entire chapter is devoted to one horse. The horse in question cannot be claimed as the best horse ever to grace the Ascot turf but he remains the most popular horse to have ever graced the Ascot turf. His name: Brown Jack.
An element of horse racing that grieves me is the reuse of famous equine names of the past. Though to the horse its name is of little consequence, to the human element it should be of great importance. I was enraged when Coolmore named a horse Spanish Steps a decade or so back and many people rallied to my cause. To this day, the majority of correspondence I receive is about blogs I have uploaded about perhaps my favourite racehorse of all-time.
A good while back a horse came from France with the name of Brown Jack and I was pretty narked about it and wrote to the racing Post to complain about it. People must be reminded that Brown Jack was the Desert Orchid of his day. He had public houses names after him, as well as a steam locomotive. Away from Ascot, he was the winner of the second Champion Hurdle ever run. He was, I stand to be corrected, the first horse to have a book written about his life. R.C. Lyle. A great book. With what I deem faint praise, Ascot stage a 2-mile handicap named in his honour. He won the Ascot Stakes in 1928, was second in the race the following year, though he won the Alexandra Stakes a couple of days later, and went on to win Alexandra Staes for the next 6-years. Steve Donogue worshipped him and when he was retired on winning the race for a sixth time in 1934, grown men were seen to weep. He deserves a full-size statue at Ascot. He should be honoured, as Seam Magee honoured him, above all other winners at Royal Ascot since 1934, including Frankel.
We all live in the shadow of these great horses. We cannot be seen to allow them to drift into the dark of the unremembered.

I received an e-mail today from someone in New Zealand regarding how to contact the writer Chris Pitt, author of ‘Fearless’, ‘Down to the Beaten’, ‘A Long Time Gone’ and many of the best books ever written about the sport. I have suggested a few routes to discovering Chris Pitt’s contact details and I thought I would extend the enquiry to anyone who might read this blog. I always try to help anyone who gets in touch with a question and query and I am disappointed when I cannot directly provide answers.

​I like David Jennings. I enjoy his style of writing. I enjoy his opinions and his tipping makes me feel better about myself. If I knew him, I suspect I would pinhole him as a ‘good egg’, which is old folks speak for a decent fellow.
He does, though, occasionally, depending on how you view such opinions, either put his head above the parapet unfearing of the bullets that might fly his way or those opinions can be viewed as pretty darn well stupid. Putting in the public domain that only two colts can possibly win the Epsom Derby this season is, to my mind, firmly in the latter category.
Delacroix looks solid; a perfectly reasonable Derby favourite. The Lion In Winter on the other hand, although darn certain to win a clutch of Group 1’s in the future, looks too shaky and flaky at this moment for any one to install him as one of only two colts with the ability to win the 2025 Epsom Derby. He sweated-up quite badly at York yesterday and even proved half-heartedly reluctant to go forward to his stall, an unusual trait for a Ballydoyle horse. And for the first two-furlongs he was a right old handful, as if he was wanting to test if Ryan Moore’s reputation as a great horseman was justified. It was; Ryan won the battle.
If he were not trained by Aidan O’Brien, he would be 20/1 for the Epsom Derby rather than 6/1. Of course, if Aidan tells us The Lion In Winter will improve leaps and bounds for the run, all past evidence dictates we should believe him. I am of the opinion, though, that the Derby razzmatazz is what may defeat him if he goes to Epsom, and I suspect that Aidan, given he has half-a-dozen other Derby candidates, will take the cautionary route of sending the horse to Chantilly and the French Derby.
Pride of Arras looks a nice prospect, though he did not look a Derby winner to me, yet as Epsom will be only his third-run he is as entitled to come on for the run every bit as much as The Lion In Winter.
To return to David Jennings bold prediction that there are only two candidates for Epsom glory this year, I say this – have you forgotten Ruling Court? I also have an instinctive liking for the Dermot Weld-trained Purview.

In his column today Chris Cook put up a lively defence of the decision by the French stewards to kick-out She’s Perfect and to promote Zarigana as the winner of the French 1,000 Guineas. He almost persuaded me that She’s Perfect was legitimately disqualified due to Shoemark being unable to keep his mount running in a straight line. He made a persuasive argument for the principle that all races should be run fairly. I would argue that not one of the first three kept to a straight line and when push came to shove the two contenders did not touch.
In our desperately annoying present-day wokish environment, though I accept that Barzalona caused his filly no harm, fourteen-hits (2 with the whip, 12 with his hand) was unsightly and not a good look for the sport. How hand-slapping is any different to using the reins as a substitute whip as Rachael Blackmore chose to do at Cheltenham the season before last, and was cautioned for it, is hard to defend.
But the main reason why Chris Cook did not win me to his side of the fence was that he made no mention of the view of the incident from the patrol camera following the runners. It is as clear as a cloudless sky that the coming together with Exactly by She’s Perfect was nothing more substantial than a brush, while Exactly went sideways for some distance to collide with Zarigana and was this incident that cost Barzelona the opportunity to win the race, though losing his whip must also have contributed.
On the balance of the evidence, I believe the appeal should succeed, though I doubt it will. Fairness, I suggest, is how you wish to define it.

On a day when Jody Townend will don the Royal silks at Leopardstown in a Ladies only handicap, in the preceding apprentice race there are 8 females slated to ride in the race, though two of them are on possible substitutes and will need withdrawals to be able to take part. I suspect that 6 female riders in an unrestricted gender race in Ireland must constitute both a record and a significant step forward for female jockeys in Ireland. Perhaps the Rachael Blackmore legacy will be on the flat for females and not over the jumps.