As much as I admire Aidan O'Brien, and not by how much I get annoyed by the lack of substance that falls from his mouth when interviewed, I have my fingers crossed that Andrew Balding pulls it out of the fire and manages to win the trainers title race for no other reason than the Balding family have played a large part in my enjoyment of horse racing over my sixty + years of my small involvement in the sport. O'Brien can win the title next year or the year after, this might be Balding's one and only opportunity. His father was only champion once, in the year of Mill Reef's Derby and Arc success and it might be the same for the son, and this might yet be that year.

In a Racing T.V. podcast, the five panelists, Ruby, Lydia, Nick, Jane and the young buck Josh, all had a go at predicting who might be 'the one to follow' this year, jockey or trainer, and Lydia Hislop plumped for John Dawson. Given his success at Cheltenham yesterday and that he is a young trainer with only a handful of horses, that was some shout from the ever insightful Lydia Hislop. 

If you or I were severly in debt, mortgage payments outstanding, utility bills unpaid, etc, we could lose our house and be taken to court for non-payment of bills etc. Amo Racing has 55-million-quid of liabilities yet they are allowed to continue buying bloodstock. Amo is built on shifting sand, relying on loans to keep the lights on and its founder,with Kia Joorabchian, Amo's founder, continuing to walk tall. As always, it is one rule for the rich, another for the poor. It is the same with Manchester United, hundreds of million pounds in debt, yet still in the Premier League. Again, different strokes of fortune for the poor compared to the rich and influential.

Kieran Fox lost his appeal yesterday against a 10-day non-trier ban imposed by the Wolverhampton stewards. I have not seen a replay of this race, so I cannot have an opinion on the rights and wrongs of this case. Except to say this: Fox in his defence said if he had ridden his mount more aggressively in the early stages of the race, his mount would not have had the energy to run on at the end of the race. The Wolverhampton stewards and the appeal panel were of the opposite opinion. On my scant knowledge of this case, I conclude that there was no proof that Fox deliberately rode not to win. He may have ridden an injudiscious race but that does not equate to cheating, which is, in effect, what he has been found guilty of. The stewards may be right, if he had ridden a different race, he might have finished closer to the winner. Fox also cannot prove that argument wrong. Case unproven, as I see it. You may think differently.

I enjoy reading about the history of our sport. If you only concern yourself with the present day, it is easy to think that there were neither great horses nor jockeys before the era of Lester Piggott. Like me, you may have knowledge of Fred Archer's career but not to the extent that he dominated the sport. Yes, he shot himself but there was more to him than mere suicide. And when someone lists the great jockeys of the sport, Moore, Dettori, Piggott, Richards, Archer, to name the top few, it is easy to believe there were no great jockeys between Archer and Sir Gordon Richards. To name three, Steve Donoghue, Frank Wootton and Danny Maher.

Maher was American, the Steve Cauthen of his day. He did not serve an apprenticeship in the U.S. yet in his first three-years as a jockey, he rode 350-winners. When he came to Britain, he was soon in demand. It was said he had God-given hands, blessed with wonderful judgement and the top trainers wanted his services, especially on two-year-olds. He rode for Lord Derby at the time George Lambton trained for him, Lord Rosebury and was stable jockey for Alec Taylor at Manton. He won all of the classics at least once and if he was criticised it was because he preferred to win by a head or a neck when he might have won by lengths. He even rode in a hurdle race, and won. He rode 1421-winners in Britain to add to the 350 in the U.S.  Ill health forced him into early retirement and he died in a nursing home in 1919, aged only 35. John Fairfax-Blakeborough in his book 'Paddock Personalities' said he died of lung disease, which suggests to methat he succumbed to T.B.

Maher seems almost forgotton nowadays, with no race named as a memorial to him.