TODAY. A BUDDING TALENT. 'MENTALLY DISTURBING.'

I suspect the official/unofficial start of the long wait for the National Hunt Festival to come around is sometime in October, though the longing begins the moment the last horse in the Martin Pipe crosses the finishing line. To me, though, the wait in earnest begins today, Greatwood Day at Newbury and the day I.T.V. visits f Kelso. Today is the week before the Imperial Cup, the last race of importance - it was once upon a time a more important and prestigious race than even the Champion Hurdle - before the great roar that is the cutting of the riband that launches the best race-meeting in the world.

Perhaps it is right that today's racing is low key for a Saturday, with no race having any bearing on what will happen between the most important four-days on the calendar. Protektorat has a school round at Kelso (hopefully) where he will not (hopefully) have to drop his head and fight like a tiger to have his head first over the finishing line. A nice, easy race is what he deserves after all the battles he has taken part in down the years. It seems a decade or more ago since the present Mrs Harry Skelton won on him up at Aintree in the pouring rain. Bridget was a good jockey in her own right, it should be remembered.

Kelso and its surroundings is beautiful; if you have not visited, you should, and make it a long weekend.

I think it is unfortunate, and perhaps missing a trick, that Newbury's Greatwood charity day is not better promoted. Greatwood do such wonderful work for both retired racehorses and children with learning and physical disabilities and the sport should never consider that the money it raises for the charity is enough. When it comes to equine welfare and reaching out to a wider society 'enough should never be considered enough'.

The Greatwood Gold Cup is always a competitive affair and the card in general makes for a good day out. I just feel that Newbury, my idea of the best National Hunt course in the country (and flat, if I am honest) should in some way be aligned with the Cheltenham Festival. Perhaps a bonus could be applied to the Greatwood, with a six-figure bonus for a horse that wins both the Greatwood and the Plate at the Festival. Whether that is finacially feasible in the present doom and gloom climate I am not sure, and races with bonuses attached to them have gone out of fashion over the past few years, with William Hill's bonus attached to four 'National trials' and the Aintree National simply a roadblock to doing what is needed and having half-a-dozen 'win and you are in' races throughout the season. But I digress. Boy, that bone is chewy!

So, perhaps Newbury should include a race that is not presently catered for at the Festival, and is seemingly missed by so many trainers - a 2-mile 4-furlong novice chase, with a prize-fund similar to what it might have if it was included at the Festival. If the race was already in existence at Newbury perhaps Gordon Elliott and his English owners might have been tempted to give Cheltenham a miss with Romero Coolio?

Is anyone else as impressed as I am by Aamilah Aswat? Guchen is a good ride for an inexperienced rider, I accept, and she can only be truly assessed when she gets the leg-up on horses that need stronger handling and do not jump as well as Guchen. All I can say is that clearly she has nice, light hands and in the two races she has won on Guchen she has demonstrated a good degree of race awareness. Yes, I admit, she possibly was told by  Bailey or  Nicholls that she won too far yesterday, 19-lengths could have been 5 if she had ridden out hand and heels and not used her whip four-times when the race was already won. She will learn, though, as all young jockeys must do, as, no doubt, Harry Cobden or Sean Bowen had to learn from their mistakes. Overall, though, this young woman has ability and I hope over the next eighteen-months she is given every opportunity to succeed. Her face is an asset for this sport, as is her personality.

It is always fascinating to be given a glimpse into the world of someone who lives at the summit of his or her profession. Today, in an interview in the Racing Post by the always entertaining David Jennings, David Casey gave an insight into what it is like working as an assistant to Willie Mullins, a position he has held for 11-years. The quote 'Fun. Humorous. Busy. Frustrating. Mentally Disturbing.' will cause merriment at Closutton and will be quoted by journalists and enthusiasts for long after Willie Mullins has been succeeded by his son, Patrick. Despite his domination over the past ten-years nobody is yet, that I am aware of, to say a bad word about him.