A different day.

The unsaddling enclosure at Cheltenham is one of the loneliest places in the world. It is here that the broken shards of hopes and dreams quietly swept away.
In that little square of green grass, as the cheers for Dodging Bullets and Sam Twiston-Davies rumbled from the winner's enclosure, a big black horse walked round whilst a small, huddled group of humans gazed at him in puzzlement and worry. The vet was there, smart in his tweed suit, but there did not seem to be anything wrong with the horse. He looked quite calm, not bothered by anything, just a little muted perhaps.

Sprinter Sacre was once a dancing, dazzling, gleaming champion, who could set sixty thousand people on a roar without moving out of second gear. And now, here he was, pulled up in the race he used to win by seventeen lengths.

In the pre-parade ring, he had looked magnificent. He was the same gleaming physical specimen that has delighted so many people for so long. Oddly, it was Dodging Bullets who would not knock your eye out, a little tucked up, a tiny bit starey in his coat. People said he was not a spring horse, and I thought he looked a little out of sorts. So much I know: he flew up the hill, whilst Sprinter laboured behind, and Barry Geraghty, who would never let anything happen to that horse, called it a day.

I had braced myself for the fact that the great champion had gone, but it's a melancholy thing to see. Of course a secret part of me hoped he would lift his head, hear the roar, and romp back to his rightful place. Yesterday was the day of fairy tales; today, under a surly sky, with Cleeve Hill doleful in the gloom, was the day of reality.

I hope they retire Sprinter.  I hope they find him something useful to do, because he's an active intelligent horse who needs a job; something not too taxing for the old ticker; something that will make him prick his ears and feel pride in himself. He always had a swagger about him, a hint of peacock preen. He'd need a little acclamation and applause from time to time.

Sire de Grugy also had to cede his crown, but I think he will be back. The ground was a bit quick and his preparation has been unorthodox and he's still got the fire in his belly.

Perhaps the most bittersweet of all was watching dear old Sizing Europe. He really was the pick of the paddock, looking more like seven than fourteen, gazing up at the gathered crowd with bright interest, lighting up the gloomy day. He bowled along for a while, reminding me of glory days past, and then it all got a bit fast for his old legs and he faded. But in that unsaddling enclosure, in contrast to the sadly shaking heads of the Sprinter connections, Sizing Europe's lad was wreathed in smiles, and Henry De Bromhead was giving him affectionate congratulatory pats. 'Ah,' said the lad, 'he's had a grand day out.'

One lady had come especially to see him, and was taking pictures, ruthlessly igoring the Nicholls victory party going on only fifty yards away. She obviously loved Sizing Europe and that was who she had come to see. She was allowed to pat the glorious old fella on the neck and her smile was that of a child who has been granted an unprecedented treat. The travelling head lass smiled too, as Sizing Europe skittered about, his ears pricked towards the applause that once was his: 'I'm afraid he's not very good at standing still,' she said. He was once very, very good at running fast, and he's still full of the joys and entirely undismayed by defeat, so perhaps they'll find him a race or two yet.

In contrast to Ruby Tuesday, when I could not back a loser, it was a day of defeats. My lovely Kings Palace looked his usual ravishing self, and went off with dash and purpose and I thought he would delight as he has all season, but he folded tamely, in the mysterious way that thoroughbreds sometimes do. It was a day of different pleasures to the first day. Just seeing dear Kings Palace had to be enough; the soaring victory I had hoped for was not to be. I really, really wanted the Champ to have a winner, so I could roar him up the hill, and the crowd could go crazy nuts in the head, and the valedictory cries of AP could ring round the Cotwsold hills. But he rode no winners, and seeing that familiar determined figure in real life for the last time, trying to imprint him on my memory so I could bore the great-nieces and nephews, making mental snapshots that I could bring out on a rainy day, also had to be enough.

Despite the fact that I bang on about ignoring the humans and going to see the horses, I did run into two of my favourite humans in the world. Both were huge racing fans in their teens and early twenties. I used to go with one of them to Sandown and Kempton and Newbury; we watched Desert Orchid together on his high days and holidays, when people would throw hats, newspapers, scarves, anything, in the air, and commentators went made with superlatives. The other I would see at every race meeting I attended, his eyes lit with dreams of glory.
Both of them took their passion and decided to make it their job. Doing what you love is great advice but very hard, but they both did it. They both say, with slight amazement, that they are living the dream. One is a trainer, and one a bloodstock agent. One had just come back from Meydan, where his most beloved old handicapper had just won a huge race, and one secretly believes that he might, just might, have bought the winner of this year's Derby. And only ten minutes ago we were all twenty together, wondering whether Desert Orchid could ever shake off his Cheltenham bad luck and finally win the Gold Cup.

They bought me pints of Guinness and the years rolled away and I called them my boys because even though we are all nearly fifty, they will always be boys to me.
The other amazing human thing was that, in a crowd of thousands, I bumped into the equine photographer I most admire after the untouchable Edward Whitaker. Michael Harris is not even a professional; he takes time off from his day job to take photographs of horses for love. Some of them are so beautiful they make me catch my breath. I've followed him on Facebook for a while and suddenly there he was, buying a cup of coffee from the same stall as I.

I've tried to take some pictures this week and I can tell you that catching good shots on a racecourse is one of the hardest things I've ever attempted. It's one thing, getting the red mare looking enchanting in her quiet field; it's quite another in a moving, teeming, crowded place, with the light seeming always to come from the wrong direction and everybody always moving about in a most disobliging way.

I take my hat off to Michael, who has taken his passion for horses and his passion for photography and made them into something very wonderful.

It was not Ruby Tuesday. It was more contemplative and less giddy. There was grit in the oyster. But without the grit, there is no pearl.

And when I got home, after thinking all this, and getting it all sorted out in my mind, I found that the one thing I had been saying all day had in fact happened. David Pipe won the bumper. And I had been on first thing at 8-1.

I laughed and laughed and laughed.

 

Today’s pictures:

A few snaps for you. If you want to see good ones, go to Michael Harris Photography on Facebook:

When I look at that picture, I think of one of the saddest parts in Out of Africa, when Meryl Streep says something like:

He gave us joy; we loved him well. He was not ours. He was not mine.

The last day. Or, different kinds of winning.

I wake up thinking: ‘Oh, Bob.’

Today is the Gold Cup, and little Bob’s Worth is taking his second go at it. My first morning thought is how lovely it would be to see a two-time winner of jumping’s greatest race who is known to everyone as Bob. Every time Nicky Henderson says the word Bob, his face lights up with fondness and hope. Sometimes, someone from Seven Barrows posts a picture on the internet, of Bob, dozily hanging out in his barn with Oscar Whisky. The two of them live together, like a pair of crusty old bachelors, in a rambling, rather scruffy old barn. I love that too.

Yesterday, neither dream quite came true. Jonjo O’Neill and JP McManus, those canny old campaigners, snatched the prize with More of That, under a perfect ride from Barry Geraghty. Annie Power, a stern look on her chestnut face, chased him home, but could not get past. People will say she didn’t stay, or wasn’t as good as everyone thought, but it was her first go at three miles, her first time on the big stage, and it was clear the occasion got to her a little. She’ll be back, and she’ll be brilliant, and in some ways I love her even more, now that she has been roughed up a bit in battle, rather than strolling about having everything her own way.

Big Buck’s looked ravishing, the look of eagles still in his eye. For half the race, he travelled like the Titan of old. He jumps a hurdle like no other horse. The really brilliant ones, like Hurricane Fly, ping their hurdles; it’s not really a jump, it’s a kind of flip, bringing the obstacle under them whilst still running, as if the hurdle becomes part of their stride. It’s quite hard to describe. Big Buck’s does not ping, he flows and floats, as if he is in slow motion, but so fast that he loses not an inch of ground. It’s a glorious thing to watch.

He travelled, he flowed over his hurdles, he looked as mighty as ever. Sam Twiston-Davies gave him a lovely, quiet, intelligent ride. And then - after all the brilliance, after all the dominance, after all the years when nothing could get him off the bridle – he was asked the question, and there was no answer. Age and setbacks at last had him in their crocodile grip.

But he was not disgraced. He ran on to finish fifth. Fifth in a World Hurdle, after fourteen months off with a tendon, at the age of eleven, is pretty impressive in its own right. I’m glad they gave him one last go at it. And I’m glad that at once, after the race, Paul Nicholls said they would retire him.

The gracious, athletic racehorse, his head low, his ears pricked, walked round the paddock one last time, in the glancing afternoon sun. As the news came over the loudspeakers, the crowd stood and applauded.

It was a thank you. Thanks for the mighty days, the jubilee days, the hats in the air days.

You could set your watch by Big Buck’s. All horses have mysterious bad days, even the most brilliant. For eighteen runs, Big Buck’s never had a bad day. It’s hard enough to get an ordinary horse to win three races in a row, let alone eighteen. To do it at the highest level is a sort of joke brilliance.

That is why the crowd rose. It knew greatness when it saw it. It knew that ones like this don’t come around very often. Respect, and gratitude, was due.

Rose Loxton, who looks after Big Buck’s, was in floods of tears. Paul Nicholls, who is a professional to his bones, let the ordinary, vulnerable human shine through, patting his great hero on the shoulder, walking round with him, his eyes light with love and as much pride as if the old fella had won.

He did win, in the end. Winning is not just getting past the post with your head in front. There are other victories.

The most lovely thing of all is that Big Buck’s will retire to Ditcheat, and stay with his beloved Rose. I think of him teaching the young ones, who come over from France, raw and gangly and not knowing anything, how to go steadily up the hill. Every yard needs an old-timer who can show the young ones how to go up the hill. Perhaps every human does, too.

So, funnily enough, even though the impossible dream did not happen, it was a day with its own loveliness.

I had two thrilling winners, both with jockeys I particularly like. Dynaste came back to his best, under a smiling Tom Scudamore, much to my delight. And Fingal Bay, after time off with injury and a disastrous brush with chasing, was patiently nursed back by the Hobbs team, and fought all the way to the line, under the great Richard Johnson drive, winning by a nose. I have hardly any voice left at all.

But it really is not all about the winners. Perhaps the keenest pleasure I had all day was watching one of my most loved stalwarts, Double Ross, run a huge race to finish third in the novice chase. He jumped some of the fences as beautifully as anything I’ve ever seen, seeing a perfect stride, coming up out of Sam Twiston’s hands. And dear old Hunt Ball was back, in the Ryanair, rather thrown in the deep end at 25-1. But he got into a lovely rhythm and galloped strongly and jumped accurately, and he finished an honourable fourth. After all the noise and scandal and the mad trip to America, that bonny horse coming back where he belongs, showing that his talent is real, that he was no flash in the pan, was winning indeed.

Today, there is Bob.

Why does one love one horse and only admire another? I can’t tell you. I love Bob because he’s just a little unassuming fellow. He is tiny, by chasing standards. He’s got a short neck and a small, intelligent head. You’d walk straight past him, never thinking he was a champion. You might think: that looks like a bonny, bright fella. But you would not think a world-beater.

Sometimes, he doesn’t even jump that well. He can muddle over a few. He can hit a flat spot in his races and seem as if he is labouring. He does not do the huge leaps or the raking stride of some of my equine heroes.

Here is what Bobs Worth does. He fights. He puts that little head down and he battles and battles and battles. In that small, compact body, hides the heart of a lion. ‘He’ll never stop galloping for you,’ says Nicky Henderson.

You know how I feel about a trier. Bob tries, like nothing else.

I’m a great admirer of Silviniaco Conti, and I hope my big, bonny old favourite, Teaforthree, might run into a place. But I’m shouting for Bob, even though winning two Gold Cups is one of the most Herculean tasks in racing. If it could be done on heart alone, then Bob would be home and hosed.

Could one more dream come true?

Today traditionally is the day I would always call Big Buck’s day. I would wake up like a child at Christmas, my heart beating at the thought of the magnificence to come.

Now, as the new pretenders start to rear their glorious heads, it may be Annie Power day.

Annie Power is the queen in waiting. She may be one of the great race mares, spoken of in the same breath as Dawn Run. She is tough, strong, and enthusiastic, with a dash of stardust about her. She has found everything she has done so far ridiculously easy.

The received wisdom is that she is a glittering star, and that Big Buck’s is a waning moon. He’s eleven, which would make this task tough for him even in the best year. But he has not had the best year. He’s been off with a tendon; his last run was a losing battle. The Irish, whose eyes are indeed smiling, think that Annie will scoot up the hill, leaving the old champion trailing in her wake.

I love her. She thrills me. I hope she stays around for years. I think she might one day take her place in the Gold Cup. If she can win today, which is in itself a tremendous ask, I shall throw my hat in the air.

My absurd old heart still belongs to Big Buck’s. He has delighted everyone who loves racing for so long. He is in a class of his own.

He should not win. All the odds are stacked against him. But he is Big Buck’s. He is, as the old racing hands say, different gravy. If anyone can pull it out of the fire, he can.

Anything could happen. The old warrior could pull up, or he could battle up the hill to regain his crown. The young queen could find the big stage too much, and go out like a light. She has never run at this level, and she has never gone this far. Or she could rise to the occasion, and soar to new heights. The anticipated duel may not materialise at all. At Fishers Cross could refind his brilliance and beat the both of them.

It’s not a betting day for me. I’m up on the meeting; my punting race is run. It really is a love day. Big Buck’s owes his adoring fans not one thing. He has given so much. If he can make the improbable come true, it will be the story of the festival, and it will truly be a dream to dream. It would also be the training performance of the year from Paul Nicholls, who keeps the faith with his mighty campaigner. He has said that he tips his hat to the brilliance of the great mare, but ‘mine won’t go down without a fight.’ It would also be the ride of his life for young Sam Twiston-Davies, one of the brightest lights in the National Hunt game.

Win or lose, I hope Big Buck’s runs his race, and comes home safe, with his head held high.

Even though he is the emperor of my heart, I do thrill to the good mare. You know how I feel about the mares. This morning, I gave Red a breeze. She was light as air, smooth as silk, so sweet and responsive that I really let her go. Out loud, in the cool Scottish air, I stood up in my stirrups, threw the reins at her, and cried: ‘Come on, Annie. Go, go.’ She went. As I slid off, and congratulated her, for her own private brilliance, I said, seriously: ‘You are my own little Annie Power.’ She blew through her nostrils. She nodded at me. She gave me her velvet nose to stroke. She knows. She ran round at the back on gaff tracks, but in her own mind, and in mine, she is the champion to end them all.

 

My own private Annie:

Dreaming the Dream.

The thing I forget about Cheltenham is the emotion. There is the love, there is the hope, there is the terror. Yesterday, one great dream came true, as the mighty Quevega put her honest, battling little head down, and galloped into the history books. She won the Mares’ Hurdle for the sixth year on the bounce, with a performance that was all guts, and I cried tears of joy. The tough mares move me like almost nothing else.

Earlier in the day, a cloud moved over the dazzling sun, as Our Conor, with his boldness, and his enthusiasm, and his bright white face, took a fatal fall.

No matter how much I tell myself that horses are as fragile as they are flinty, that they can die from getting cast in the box, or from a careless kick in the field, or from a sudden colic, I never get used to this. The lad who looked after the horse was led away in hopeless tears. I know that dark space of the empty box. My father’s great National hope, Earthstopper, ran an absolute blinder to finish fifth, and then dropped down dead from a heart attack. The fragile ticker, undetected, could have gone at any time. I remember Dad’s inconsolable weeping, on that bleak drive home from Liverpool to Lambourn.

My beautiful Red, so precious to me, shall not be here forever. I know, every day, that all it takes is one wrong step, an unseen rabbit hole, a freak field accident, a mystery infection, like the one that mastered the sweet little HorseBack filly. They gallop into the heart, and can gallop away at any moment.

I thought about Our Conor all night, and woke up remembering him this morning. I stopped thinking about the horses I loved, the ones I wanted to win so badly, the ones I yearned to have their moment in the sun, and only hoped that they would all come home safe.

And then, slowly, slowly, the dream started again. The engine began to rev up. The optimism grew; the hopes rose. There is a horse called Sire De Grugy, trained in a relatively small yard, owned by a group of people who include plumbers and hairdressers, who only have this one horse. Compared to the mighty guns who arrive for the festival, the millionaires and billionaires with their shining strings of stars, these were underdogs indeed. Sire De Grugy is a two-miler, and his class was overshadowed by the mighty black aeroplane that is Sprinter Sacre, who drove all before him at this distance. But suddenly, Sprinter was out for the year, and the rangy, athletic chestnut with the shining white blaze could step into the spotlight.

He’s been winning beautifully all season. On the book, he was the one to beat in the Champion Chase, the finest test of the two mile chaser. But the doubts started to swarm. He had been beaten twice at Cheltenham, and horses for courses is a cast-iron rule. Also, he had had a long season, running some races in heavy ground, which can take it out of even the finest athlete by the time spring comes around. And my own private worry was that he could be almost too bold over his fences, really attacking them, taking off a mile away, reaching over the birch with his raking front feet scything through the air. At Prestbury Park, at top speed, against the best, there is no room for error. I fretted that his very bravery might be his undoing.

Besides, as Dick Francis wrote, there are no fairy tales in racing. So I steadily and sternly tried to talk myself out of Sire De Grugy. I failed. The whole thing was too much. He’s such a bright, bonny horse. He’s such a trier. His trainer and jockey are father and son, so there was the whole family romance of the thing. His owners are the most enthusiastic, happy, sporting bunch you could imagine. They had said before the race that it was enough just to be here. There is no greed or grasp in them. I wanted this result more than diamonds. I threw my cash on out of loyalty and love more than flinty judgement, and hid behind the sofa.

The sun shone. The parade started. There they all were, the stars: the clever, bright, bold equines, with their ears pricked, ready for the test to come. They were all so beautiful, so fit, so gleaming with health.

Jamie Moore settled Sire De Grugy back in the pack, as they went off at a furious pelt. It was an intelligent, instinctive, brave ride. He’s only a young jockey, but he did not panic. He let his fella get into a lovely rhythm, and did not hassle him. You could see the trust between horse and rider. But as the pounding hooves ate up the green turf, and the sinews stretched, and the race started to take shape, I worried. There was a lot of ground to make up.

Sire De Grugy had his sensible hat on today. He did not take chances. He fiddled a couple, and then jumped neatly and economically, out of his stride. He seemed to know that this was not the time for showboating.

And suddenly, miraculously, against the odds, he was the only horse in the race, coming to the last with a ton in hand, romping away up the hill, as if it were his favourite place in the world. He won going away, like a really, really good horse.

The place erupted. My mother and I, who had been shouting our heads off, hugged each other and burst into synchronised tears. At the course, hats and newspapers were flying through the air. ‘I love him to pieces,’ Jamie Moore said, without let or hindrance, on national television, falling on his horse’s neck. Jockeys are hard men, in body and spirit. But they are not ashamed to use the word love, because that is what it is. The losing riders gathered round him, clapping him on the back, kissing him on the cheek. Love was everywhere. It was a win that was richly deserved and properly celebrated.

As the horse and rider walked back to the winning enclosure, all the jockeys came out of the weighing room and formed a guard of honour to greet them. Sam Twiston-Davies and Aidan Coleman were hoisted onto shoulders, waving and smiling and laughing their heads off. I’ve never seen that, ever, in racing. My mother, who remembers Arkle and Mill House, has never seen that. There was something about this, perhaps because it was the underdog, perhaps because the Moores work so hard and really deserve it, perhaps because the horse himself has never quite had his due, that brought out an unprecedented reaction. All etiquette was flung aside, as the Duchess of Cornwall, presenting the cup, had a scarf in the owners’ colours draped round her neck. She too was laughing fit to bust. Everything was in chaos, as joy overtook the day.

It was one of the best things I ever saw in my life.

And just as I thought there was no more emotion left in me, it was time for Balthazar King, in the cross-country. He is one of my favourite horses in training, because he is so genuine and he jumps so gloriously and he adores Cheltenham as if it is his spiritual home. But today, even this course specialist was up against it, as he shouldered top weight, on ground softer than he likes. The Irish raider was out to get him, and there were people who said Big Shu was nailed on.

In the glancing sun, my darling old Balthazar jumped and galloped and danced. His rider, Richard Johnson, one of the great gentlemen of the weighing room, and a horseman to his bones, cut corners and found a perfect stride and kept his bonny fella in a lovely rhythm.

Balthazar King hit the front, and they were coming for him, coming for him, up that treacherous hill. The weight would get him, the ground would get him, Any Currency was finishing like a freight train. The winning post would not, could not, come in time. I was bawling my head off. Stanley the Dog was barking fit to bust. My mother was roaring. And Balthazar King, one of the most honest, admirable, true horses you will ever see, back at his beloved Cheltenham, kept his dear nose in front, and flashed past the post by a short head, after almost four gruelling miles.

I run out of words for love.

The sun shone again, literally, metaphorically. The stars glittered in their orbits. The dreams came true.

 

I’m breaking all my copyright rules one more time. I had to show you this picture, because here is the joy. I hope the Press Association will forgive me:

The best week of the year. Or, love, not money.

The sun is shining. The red mare and I had a whooping, racing canter. I threw the reins at her and stood up in the stirrups and let her go, and she pricked her ears and bowled along as if she knew that this was the day her mighty cousins will be strutting their stuff on the most enchanted stage of all.

Because, my darlings, IT’S CHELTENHAM. It’s the elite. It’s the best, the brightest, the bravest. It’s humans of such flintiness and skill and courage and resolution that it takes my breath away. It’s horses of such bravery and beauty and willingness that I can sometimes hardly believe they exist in the world.

I’ve been doing my homework, almost literally. I’ve been sitting up with my notebook, watching recordings of old races, beadily checking the course form, watching for chinks in equine armour, looking for the ones that really, really want it. Because on this undulating course, with its huge obstacles and its stretching hill, they have to want it. You can see the alpha horses, the herd leaders, who rumble through a race, shouldering the lesser beasts aside.

And yet, the whole point of Cheltenham is that anything can happen. After all that study, I realise that I do not know what will win. I’ve been building up my betting bank, and now I’m hardly going to use it. It’s not about the money. It’s not about the brilliance of picking the right horse for the right day. It’s about the love.

I love Quevega, the toughest little mare since Dawn Run set the place on a roar. I love Hurricane Fly, with his warrior spirit. I love the novices – the classy Irving, the flying Vautour, the honest and strong Wicklow Brave, so very well named. I love the old campaigners – dear old Alfie Sherrin, enigmatic Restless Harry. I love the humans too – the genius wizard that is Willie Mullins, the mighty Champ that is AP, the smiling young pretender that is Sam Twiston-Davies. I love Paul Nicholls, with his bullish faith in his horses, and Ruby Walsh, with his canny grace on a horse, and Nicky Henderson, with his heart on his sleeve and his race glasses trembling so much he can hardly watch the race. I’d love to see the charming Tom Scu have a good meeting, and the proper gentleman that is Dickie Johnson get one on the board.

I don’t know what will happen. If Hurricane Fly and Quevega can win, I shall cry tears of pure joy. But I’d be equally delighted to see The New One storm up the hill, or My Tent or Yours show his class. I’ve had a whisper for Manyriverstocross, and I’m very sweet on Dodging Bullets, and I’ve got a tiny little feeling for Green Flag at a big price, who has travelled all the way from sunny Scotland.

It is my best week of the year. My heart is beating. Oh, oh, the love. What a great game it is. My darling old dad will be looking down from the great betting shop in the sky.

What joy these extraordinary horses do offer. I do not just love them, I admire them. In their honest and authenticity, they can teach humans a thing or two. Most of all, I hope they all give their running, and they all come home safe.

And now, I just wait for that great Cheltenham roar.

 

My own red champion, all happy and muddy and woolly, with her dear little Paint friend, in the morning sun:

Be lucky, wherever you are. May your Cheltenham dreams come true.

Happy Day

I’ve been doing a little Facebook experiment. It is called 100 Happy Days, and the idea is that every day you post something that makes you happy. It sounds very hello clouds, hello sky, but I think it is in fact quite an interesting psychological test.

I am capable of grumpiness and crankiness; I grow fretful over trifles; I am sometimes assailed by fears of the unknown future. I wrestle with mortality and the growing numbers of the Dear Departeds. (I am missing my dear old godfather a lot at the moment, and, as Cheltenham approaches, holding my late father very close to my heart.)

The lovely thing is that this idea makes me realise that even on the darkest day there is at least one happy thing, even if it is only a snowdrop or a pied wagtail or the soft eye of the red mare.

Today, there were not single spies of joy, but battalions.

The sun shone, for a starter. It really shone, with conviction and promise. The birds were singing, the woodpeckers were hammering away in the woods, the new grass was growing, to the mare’s delight.

In the morning, I found my one happy thing. It was a dilly. One of the great old cowboys, I can’t remember whether it was Tom Dorrance or Ray Hunt, said that the thing you are always looking for with your horse is that place deep inside where everything is possible, where there is only willingness. This is quite a profound thought, and sometimes feels almost metaphysical to me. It is nothing to do with technique and everything to do with heart and feel.

I thought about it with the mare this morning. I was doing some circles with her. She tends to lean in and drop her shoulder and sometimes a simple circle can be hard work. Today, though, something blossomed and spread. She started going easily within herself, in the most ravishing, smooth, floating sitting trot, describing a perfect line, so light that I was riding her with one finger. ‘There’s that place,’ I thought. I felt it in myself, deep in my gut. I felt my place of willingness and her place of willingness speak to each other, so that we found a harmony that was like flying. Hold on, I thought: THERE IT IS. There it is.

It was a feeling like no other. It transcended the actual and the physical and soared up into a realm of its own.

I was so ecstatic that I raced her out of the circle into a straight canter, as if we ourselves were roaring up the Cheltenham hill. I whooped out loud. ‘Woo, woo,’ I shouted. ‘You absolutely brilliant girl.’

You should not really be letting a thoroughbred canter about on a loose rein whilst whooping in their ear. The red mare kept her composure. She put on her sprinting shoes for a moment, and then came back under me, and gentled to a steady halt. She lifted her pretty face to the sky, and blew through her nostrils. I must not get fanciful, but I think she was as happy as I was.

That moment would have been enough. But then I went up to HorseBack for the first course of the year. The place was transformed. All the horses were in, the sun was still going like gangbusters, a wonderful group of Personnel Recovery Officers were gathered, Brook the ex-sprinter was doing a hoof-perfect demonstration, and, best of all, some of the regular veterans were back for a three-week stint.

My admiration for the veterans knows no bounds. It’s not just that they have done sterling service in places and situations I cannot even imagine, or that they face startling mental and physical challenges with stoicism and good humour, it is that they are so funny and generous, and very nice to me. I’ve got over my initial shyness, that sense of distance between the experience of a civilian and the experience of those who have served. They mob me up now, and make me shout with laughter. They think I am a bit crackers, as one of them said today, I suspect because of my ridiculous passion for horses, and my betting habit, and my Cheltenham obsession, and my tendency to open my mouth and let streams of nonsense issue forth. I take this as a big compliment. Coming from fighting men, crackers is good.

It was so lovely to see real work starting again, and all the people gathered, new faces and familiar faces, and the dear equines getting ready to do their important jobs. It reminded me of what all the effort is for, and made the hard, long winter worth it.

And then, as if all that were not enough, I backed two winners at Stratford, so that my Cheltenham bank is bulging.

I’m trying to resist the urge to put it all on Hurricane Fly. I love that horse like a brother. He is not a soft, kind horse like my mare. He is tough as teak, a dauntless warrior, a fighter and a biter. I’ve seen him almost shoulder other horses out of the way, with a bugger off look out of the corner of his canny old eye, and a surge of power that says: Champion coming through. I love him for his raw talent, his splendid athleticism, his refusal to give up. He has a wildness in him, as if he can still hear his ancestral voices, an elemental aspect, that sets him apart.

I reminded myself today that Cheltenham is not about the punting or the winning or the cash or the cleverness of picking out that one banker of the meeting. It’s about these mighty thoroughbreds I love so much. It’s about their beauty and their grace, their courage and their willingness and their power, their dancing stride and their mighty leaps. I cannot count the ways in which they make my heart sing.

I’ll have a little bet on the Fly, for loyalty, for love, for the memory of old times, but if he can reverse all the stats and see off the young shavers as he storms up the hill, it will be a sight worth more than emeralds. Even typing his name makes me smile.

So, it turned out that this was a day of manifold happinesses. I do not take that for granted for a single solitary minute.

 

Just time for a couple of  pictures, as it’s late now, and I’m tired, and I’m going to have a glass of wine and watch a replay of Quevega picking herself up off her nose at the top of the hill and surging to festival glory last year. That little battling mare makes me cry.

View from HorseBack:

The dear HorseBack horses:

My astonishing mare, taken a few days ago. A lot of happiness in that picture:

This is very naughty, because I respect copyright, but I had to show you this ravishing picture of Hurricane Fly, safely arrived at Cheltenham, blowing away the cobwebs from his journey across the sea. I hope that the very talented Alan Crowhurst will forgive me, just this once:

Of brave racing men.

One of the things I love about Twitter and Facebook is that they are not just about comical kittens and small puppies doing amusing things. They take you to places you might not necessarily go. So it was that I found myself, first thing this morning, reading an article in the Irish Independent, which was so good that I read it twice. If it had not been retweeted by a kind person on my timeline, I should never have found it. I am very glad I did.

It tells the story of the amateur rider John Thomas McNamara, who lies in Frenchay Hospital in Bristol after a critical fall at Cheltenham. It’s an astonishingly good piece. It’s the kind of article which makes me say: if you read only one thing on the internet today, make it this.

The writer in me sits back in awe and wonder, because to produce journalism this fine is a properly difficult thing to do. A lot of journalism can be efficient and effective, but is written by people who have no love for words. They don’t give a bugger about the language of Shakespeare and Milton; they just want to tell the story.

John O’Brien, not a writer I know, has a beautiful feeling for the rhythms of language, for the swoops and swings of it, for its dying falls. But he is clinical too. There is not a word wasted; each adjective is perfectly chosen. He paints a vivid picture of a world that many people don’t see; he takes you into the heart of the weighing room, and behind the white hospital door.

It is moving, but never mawkish. It pays a good tribute to a good man.

The writer in me loves it, because it is rare to read prose of that quality in the newspapers. Even some of the most garlanded columnists often descend into platitude and pablum; a disturbing number paddle in the shallow waters of received wisdom. Some are blatantly hypocritical and some seem devoted to the réchauffé. (And yet, says the cross, sceptical part of my brain, they still get paid the stupid money.) So it’s lovely to be reminded that there are still journalists out there who are so shiningly good at their craft.

But the real reason this piece made me sit up straight at seven-thirty in the morning, and catch my breath, and feel my heart flip in my chest, is much more personal.

Not so very long from now, it will have been two years since my father died. It’s a long time, and at the same time it’s nothing at all. He is close by me every day at the moment. I don’t know whether that is an anniversary thing, or just a coincidence. Perhaps it’s a Cheltenham thing. Last Wednesday, I ran into a very old friend outside the Guinness tent, whom I had not seen for years. He knew and loved my father well. As I was discussing my ridiculous accumulators and whether Dynaste would win the Jewson, the friend laughed fondly and said: ‘The apple really does not fall far from the tree.’ It was the best compliment anyone could have given me.

Whatever the reason, the old gentleman is at the front of all my waking thoughts, just now.

When the talented John O’Brien writes about the brave and beloved J.T. McNamara, a horseman who rides racing horses for love rather than money, he might, in some ways, be writing about a Corinthian from over fifty years ago. My dad was another of those flinty fellows whose gutsiness got him into trouble, in the end. He had ears ripped half off, ankles smashed, and his shoulders constantly dislocated. They almost literally fell out of their sockets in a hard finish, until he had them sewn into place, leaving wide, shiny, scarlet scars which I remember vividly from my childhood. (The eminent surgeon, Bill Tucker, once left a Saturday night dinner party to reset one of Dad’s shoulders.) But all that was nothing compared to the two broken backs and necks.

I remember learning of this when I was quite a small child. It was a bit of a legend in our house, the time Dad broke his back and his neck for the second time. I remember not quite understanding, because I thought that was the kind of thing that killed you stone dead.

The doctors sat on his bed, just like they did in this good article, and said he must never ride again, never so much as sit on a dozy old hack in a slow walk. If his poor battered body hit the ground once more, they said, he would be in a wheelchair for life, or under the sod. Dad nodded and pretended to listen, and one year later, against all orders, lined up in the Grand National. Years later, when I asked him what happened, he said, dry as a bone: ‘Fell off at the third.’

He walked away from that fall and rode out every day into his advanced age. I think, now, how lucky he was, how different everything could have been. I hope passionately that J.T. has such a lucky end, and will be able to tell his own young children the same kind of stories our father told us.

As I was writing this, the wireless was chattering in the background. There was a fascinating discussion on religion and morality going on, to which I could not pay proper attention, because I was typing fast of gallant racing gents. But one sentence suddenly struck my ear. It went something like: ‘Be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks of the hope that you have.’ I think it was St Peter who said this. My theology is thin, but it’s a question I like.

I have an answer for the hope that I have, and I have a lot of hope. I think pretty much most humans are pretty good. I think almost everyone wants to love well and be loved in return. I think ordinary people do extraordinary things, day after day, without any of them making headline news or winning prizes. I think the human heart is rather a wonderful thing, both literally and metaphorically.

You can say it’s nuts, riding fast horses over high fences. You can say it is unnecessary, in this slick, computer age. You can say it’s a risk too far. But it rather gives me hope, that there are still dauntless jockeys who do exactly that, on an obscure windy Wednesday at Huntingdon, as well as on the fabled Friday of the Gold Cup.

It gives me hope that those weighing rooms are still places of admiration and affection and brotherhood; that the jockeys all help each other out; that they are so damn sporting. They get paid a pittance, in terms of professional sport, and an ambulance follows ten yards behind them every time they go out to do their job. There is a true toughness and stoicism in that which I really like. There is authenticity, and lack of flash. There is proper old-school grit.

 

A couple of ancient, grainy pictures of my old parent, much missed, much remembered:

Here on the left, over fences:

Gritted teeth over hurdles:

Rather Tailor and Cutter, in his trusty old flat cap:

And here is the link to the brilliant article, about a fine man I have never met in my life, but who remains in my thoughts too:

http://www.independent.ie/sport/horse-racing/everybody-hurts-for-true-friend-29135214.html

Sunday. Sunshine, food, family, and a little Cheltenham recap.

After all that, it was rather a lovely Sunday.

There was walking, with dogs and children, in suddenly clement weather. There was a great deal of cooking. (I made the special little risotto cakes coated with polenta and fried in olive oil, which go down very well with the small people.) I did my HorseBack work, which soothed my frayed nerves.

I missed my mare so badly in the late morning it was like a blow at my heart. It is idiotic to miss a horse, really. At one point I thought: I don’t know how horse people ever go on holiday, ever.

Meanwhile, she herself is lounging about in her field, immaculately looked after by The Horse Talker, supplied with the highest quality Scottish hay that money can buy, probably hardly even knowing I am not there.

But I miss her lovely scent, I miss her dear face, I miss the heavy still feeling I get when she rests her head on my shoulder and goes to sleep. I miss working with her and being amazed when she does something brilliantly clever. I miss leaning over the fence and discussing with the HT every jot and tittle and detail of our small herd. (We are absurdly partisan, and very much like revisiting the subject of how perfect they are in every particular: manners, cleverness, funniness, kindness, outrageous beauty.)

The youngest cousins have just heard Five Years by David Bowie for the very first time. A seminal moment obviously for their mother and me, for whom it was the soundtrack of our formative years. They did a little dance and seemed to like it very much.

I am going to make some prawn and noodle soup with coriander and mint and chillies and drink some Guinness in honour of St Patrick (any excuse) and try not to panic at the thought of being away from my desk, with its hilltops of work waiting for me.
 
A few quick pictures from the archive:

The girlfriends, hanging out, having a bit of a chat:



The sweet face of Red the Mare:



The morning Here You Are faces that I miss:



Mr Stanley is apparently being wonderfully good and sweet, and is having a lovely time with his most excellent dog-sitter, and is visiting The Mother and the dear Stepfather and spreading joy in that house:



Must admit, I do miss that gaze, too:



And the lovely old hill:



But I do get the Smallest Cousin showing me her tremendous dance moves:



And I had the keen pleasure of Cheltenham with the Older Brother:









And the mornings I spent absurdly photographing my racing outfits for the approval of my Facebook posse still make me smile:



Out there in the internets, there are a lot of people asking: what is your favourite Festival moment? Too many to choose, is probably my answer.

The Hurricane flying high again, Sprinter Sacre laughing at them all in the sun, the brave little Bobs Worth sticking his head out all the way to the finish: all go into my Hall of Fame.
But perhaps, if I really had to choose, it was the mighty mare Quevega, who clipped heels round the back, and practically fell on her lovely nose, and still picked herself up, and even when all was lost, and she was ten or twelve lengths off the pace, switched her unstoppable engine into turbo, and roared past the field, storming up the hill into her rightful place in history.

I won’t forget that in a hurry. It’s the mares, again. Never, ever bet against the good heart of a brave mare, and she is one of the bravest I ever saw.

Cheltenham, Day Three.

Very tired. All my beloveds got beat today, yet there was some glory in the losses. First Lieutenant and Hunt Ball ran doggedly on up the hill in defeat, and made the frame, and they reminded me that it is not all about the winning, but the taking part. The first two days were about untrammelled victories: Hurricane Fly, Quevega and Sprinter Sacre, flying home, laughing at lesser mortals. I had so many doubles and trebles with them in that I was miles up on the meeting, so I could afford to bet for love today, and did not mind the setbacks.

There was a lot of joy and laughter, as unfancied long-shots came roaring home, and the mighty stables did not have it all their own way. It’s always lovely to see the less sung yards have their moment in the sun, when it’s not all Henderson and Nicholls. There was also some keen delight in watching two old veterans, Celestial Halo and Tartak, run huge races at wild prices.

There was a shadow though, the first there has been over this morning’s sunlit Prestbury Park. Two jockeys were taken to hospital with critical injuries, and one lovely chaser was put down on the track. Racing is a hard sport. I grew up in it, and know the peaks of triumph, and the troughs of despair. I remember many hushed hospital visits to my dad, and there was a time before I was born when he was told, gravely, by men in white coats, that he must never sit on a horse again. That was after he broke his back and his neck for the second time. A year later, he ignored orders, and rode in the Grand National. He rode out every day for years afterwards. I remember too his tears for horses lost, a visceral grief that leaves a stamp on the heart.

I struggle with this sometimes, as I turn on the racing. But then I remember the nature of risk. All life is risk. Humans and equines both cannot be wrapped in cotton wool. A horse can die in its box, if it lies down at an awkward angle, and cannot get up again. (It’s called being cast.) It can die in the benign surroundings of a green field, just from cantering the wrong way. A human can die looking the wrong way, crossing the street.

So, it was a more mixed day. But I saw fond old friends, and gazed over the natural beauty of that lovely amphitheatre that is Cheltenham, and I spent the day with the dear Older Brother. I got to see some of the horses I love the most up close, in all their easy, athletic, thoroughbred fineness. I watched the people who work with them, day in and day out, and saw, in every touch of the hand, and tilt of the head, and softening of the eye, the fondness they hold for their brave equine charges. Some people think racing is too flinty and ruthless, but if they could see the lads and the trainers and the jockeys, who really do wear their hearts on their sleeves, I think they might reconsider.

 

A couple of quick pictures, from the pre-parade ring and the paddock:

The absolute absolute glory of Sprinter Sacre.

Would really love to write a whole blog about this glorious day, but I am so wiped out, from emotion, and from cantering about Prestbury Park like a wild pony, that I have no strength left in my typing fingers and no coherence left in my addled brain.

It was lovely.

My friend Emma who runs HorseBack laughs every time I use that word, and we have a pact that each moment I chance it in serious HorseBack UK literature it must be stricken from the record. But today, it is the very mot juste.

I did win some more money, which is always handy, and would make my dad laugh, from his spot in the grandstand in the sky. I had Sprinter Sacre in a variety of doubles and trebles with Quevega and Hurricane Fly, so both the Irish and the English did me proud.

But, as always, it was not that which made me cry and brought me joy. It was, as I said to someone earlier today, the beauty.

Sprinter is a very beautiful horse, huge and gleaming and bonny and astonishingly well put together. He is getting the look of eagles, which my mother always says the great ones have. But even that is not quite it. It’s not just that he is magnificent to observe, walking quietly round the pre-parade ring, or cantering down to the start.

It’s the beauty of what he does on the course. It’s the wild, glorious, effortlessness of how he leaps over those fierce obstacles, as if they were nothing. It’s how he cruises past really good horses, making them panic and struggle and look second-rate.

I can’t remember who first said he was like a big black aeroplane. Barry Geraghty, perhaps, who has the keen privilege of riding him. But whoever it was, they were right. He does not run; he soars. He flies like a bird in the sky.

And that is why I clapped and cried and yelped, and turned round to complete strangers and said, Oh, oh, was that not beautiful?

And the complete strangers smiled and nodded, and said: Yes. Yes, it was.

Cheltenham update. Or, sheer joy. Or, the wonderful, glorious luck of the Irish.

 

Would love to tell you the whole story of the day, but I’ve never been so tired in my life. However, just have enough life in my fingers to type the love and delight I felt when my two best beloveds, Hurricane Fly and Quevega, stormed up the hill, defying all statistics.

On paper, in particular, the darling old Hurricane should not have won. No horse has regained the Champion Hurdle for forty years, and, aside from that dark stat, he is really considered too old, at nine, to do the business. But the lucky thing is that no one told that brave fella that everything was against him. He stuck his neck out and lengthened his stride and left brilliant horses in his wake. I backed him in cash, on the course, and I had him in a huge all for love double with the mighty mare, Quevega, and the brilliant Ruby Walsh guided them both home.

I am not ashamed to say that I burst into wild tears of joy. After Quevega, I actually HUGGED a completely strange young man in the Jockey Club stand.

The whole course erupted with joy both times. That’s the difference between being there and watching it on the television. As you stand, in the wonderful roiling cauldron that is Prestbury Park, you hear thousands of people calling RUBY RUBY RUBY, with one joyful voice. You also see the glorious wide smile of that wonderful jockey, and see the pricked ears and gentle preening of the beautiful, clever, good thoroughbreds that he rides.

I’m glad I won money, of course I am. But much more than that, I shall never forget the day I saw two mighty Irish champions smash records and make history. It really was a thing of utmost beauty. Even thinking of it now brings tears to my eyes.

And now, I’m going to have a restorative pint of Guinness and switch on the recording, so I can see on the screen those wonderful horses refuse to be denied.

Cheltenham. There really is nothing like it, in the whole wide world. Best five hundred and fifty miles I ever drove.

Cheltenham, Monkerhostin, Hurricane Fly and absurd excitement.

I am writing this at a million miles an hour at just after six. I’ve been awake for an hour, so excited about Cheltenham I cannot sleep.

I had slightly hoped I would wake early, and then I could go through all the form one more time, and invent the most cunning accumulator of all time, and make my old dad proud. Instead, I did some writing for HorseBack, because today is real red letter day and I had to mark it.

It’s possibly slightly more red letter-ish for me than for them, because it locks into my great passion as I charge off to the races. Today, I am going to meet Monkerhostin.

There is no time now to tell you how or why or all the delightful details. Monkerhostin was a really good racehorse, tough, genuine and talented. In his retirement, he is doing something even more remarkable than storming up the Cheltenham hill. He now lives with Sergeant Major George Beilby, and helps the Royal Marine through the struggles of post-Afghanistan life.

Anyway, the sergeant major is going to do some work with HorseBack, to highlight how horses can play such an extraordinary role in the path to recovery, and so, in my official capacity as Writer-in-Residence, I am going to meet him today and his glorious horse. I am beside myself. Monkerhostin is everything I love about the jumps. This is what his previous owner said about him: ‘He never gave up. Sometimes watching him down the back straight you thought he had no chance, but he never saw it like that. He wasn't always good enough but he always gave it everything he could.’

Those are the ones that stick in the memory, and make the heart lift.

So if you are at Cheltenham today, look out for Monkerhostin in the parade at 12.15pm. If the people at Channel 4 can get their act together, they might even show it on the television. And think of me, vibrating with excitement and trying vainly to act normally, when I get upsides these two remarkable people.

I can’t revise all the form now, so I’m just sticking with my beloveds. The Irish in me is strong this morning, and I’m staying true to my two darlings from over the sea, Quevega and Hurricane Fly. I’ve put them in a treble with My Tent or Yours as my charity bet for HorseBack. Channel 4 does charity bets, so I’m going to do one too. It does feel a bit cheesy, just choosing three favourites, and possibly unwise, since the favourite statistics at Cheltenham are not great. But they are the ones I love today and that’s all she wrote.

I really, really want Hurricane Fly to win, with every beat of my ridiculous heart, because I love him and because no one has regained the Champion Hurdle for forty years . But there is a reason for that, and I do think Zarkandar will run a huge race. Even when he was a baby, a raw four-year-old who knew nothing, he was amazingly tough. He’s a fighter, and he won’t go down without a tussle.

After all that, Rock on Ruby will probably beat both of them. I’d like to see Countrywide Flame run his race. He’s another of whom I am enduringly fond, although he’s probably not quite good enough to make the frame in this.

But really, today is all about a former champ, the lovely Monkerhostin, and his Royal Marine. The parade, at 12.15. Tell all your friends.

 
Only one picture today, of the special Cheltenham hat. I shall not be bringing the horse, you will be amazed to hear:



Oh, and to those of you going and those of you watching and those of you, like me, shouting yourselves hoarse, have a glorious day and a lot of good Guinness, and perhaps a winner or two.
 
PS. This is almost certainly atrociously written and riddled with howlers. Been up since five so brain already a bit addled. Forgive me.

Cheltenham madness.

For some reason, I had it in my head that I was going to give you a detailed breakdown of the whole Cheltenham betting week. It’s because one or two of the Dear Readers and the kind Facebook friends had asked for tips, and of course I generally do exactly what the readers ask. (Except when it is a request to stop with the horse stuff.)

I have been thinking about Cheltenham since October. Every time a good horse runs in a good race I get out my notebook, to file the information away for exactly this week. My William Hill account is packed with unbelievably canny ante-post gambles. I was quite overcome by my own cleverness.

But now of course the glorious moment is about to dawn, and I have no certainties left. All the horses are coming out at the declaration stage: some won’t go on the ground, some have scoped badly, some just aren’t quite at that crest and peak that Cheltenham demands. This means that some of the races are changing shape, and becoming a little clearer perhaps, although most of the big handicaps are still as murky as ever, as the enormous fields still wait to be culled, and the final weights decided.

Everything and anything could happen. Things which felt certain yesterday seem in flux now.

So, after all that, I’m not going to give you any tips. Cheltenham is the most difficult betting feat of the year, harder than Ascot even, and if I walk away with the clothes on my back I’ll be happy. Also, this year, I have a lot of loves running about. There is Overturn, of course, but there is also Midnight Chase, whom I adore, and Hunt Ball, who makes my heart beat in my chest. I’ll almost certainly have entirely sentimental bets on them. There is Dynaste, of whom I am so fond I backed him three months ago to win any race at the festival, and who actually is now looking like a really good thing.

My two Irish beloveds, Quevega and Hurricane Fly, although hot favourites, could both easily get turned over. They are statistically all wrong in the races they are contesting, and Quevega has not even been on a racecourse this season. But they both have that something special that really good horses have, that little sprinkle of magic, and they are in a magician’s hands, too. Willie Mullins can defy dry stats like no man on earth.

The funny thing is that Hurricane Fly, who is one of the highest rated horses in training, is starting to feel almost like an underdog, as the statisticians stack up the odds against him. He’s the wrong age, and they hardly ever regain such a Cheltenham crown. And then, say the knockers, what’s he really beaten this season, apart from the same bunch of horses, over and over.

I can’t stand the knockers. I’ll always back a horse against them. I’m betting that the mighty Hurricane will blow again, even though he’s all wrong on paper. I think the Fly will fly, but mostly because I really want him to. So it will be a small bet but a huge shout. It will be a holler of pure love.

What do I think of the week as a whole? I think it’s very important to remember that favourites have a lower record than usual at Cheltenham, for obvious reasons. (Someone has worked out the strike-rate is around 26% on average.) I think that sure things are less sure in that boiling cauldron than in any other place. I think if you want real fun, find a lively outsider that you admire and have a couple of quid on that. I shall be doing this with Midnight Chase, even though the stats are against him, too.

I think the ground will make a big difference, and may scupper my lovely Overturn, so don’t back anything which has not run well on soft. It also means stamina will really play its part this year. And, in my own nutty mind, I’ll be looking at the tough horses, because it’s going to be bitter cold, with a strong wind. The real, doughty, genuine horses are going to be needed for that, not the temperamental, delicate types. (I slightly put Une Artiste in this category, although she may prove me wrong.)

I think the hot favourites who are most likely to oblige are Quevega, Sprinter Sacre, Pont Alexandre and My Tent or Yours, and that might not be a bad little fourfold, even if it is shockingly obvious, and you will not be able to brag about it, since a child of six could work it out.

Everyone wants a bet of the meeting, and a banker of the meeting. The banker is obviously Sprinter Sacre but he is too short for any but the most crocodile-skinned, flint-eyed punters, so I would split my certainties between Pont Alexandre for Ireland and Dynaste for England. My bet of the meeting may easily be Salsify, on whom I grow sweeter and sweeter. He’s around 11-4, which is a perfectly respectable sort of price. He ran really well last time out, is a strong, genuine sort of horse, and has won at the festival before. I’m also quite keen on Reve de Sivola in the World Hurdle, despite my love for Oscar Whisky, and I’ve got a little feeling for African Gold for the Albert Bartlett.

As for the Gold Cup itself, I can make perfectly plausible cases for and against Bobs Worth, Long Run, Silviniaco Conti and Sir Des Champs. I’ve put myself on and off all of them in turn, starting with the honest, talented, unfussy Bobs Worth, right through the list. My pin is currently hovering over Silviniaco, for his sheer wonderful efficiency. I’m not sure I ever saw a horse who was so clinical at his fences, and I love him for it.

But what I’ve suddenly realised is that I don’t know what is going to happen, and none of it really matters. I’ll have a few idiotic accumulators, in the spirit of my old dad, and I’ll take a sensible deep breath and sit some of the more complicated handicaps out, and I’ll probably put the house on one or two of the obvious trebles. For a happy, amateurish punter like me, it really is not a competition. The winning is watching all those glorious creatures, doing what they were bred to do. Honestly, at this stage, I’m such a hippy I’d say that being alive is enough.

Love and trees, my darlings, and good, brave horses who fly through the air.

And now I really am going to stop and have some Guinness before I die a slow Death by Timeform.

No time or energy for pictures today. Just this girl, who is the real beat of my heart:

New hair, and thoughts on the Arkle. Or why I love the lovely Overturn.

Really don’t know what I am doing with this blog now. All the cards are up in the air with the onset of Cheltenham.

First of all, I decided to take some pictures of my new hair, so you could see it. The Dear Readers always have to see the new hair; it’s tradition. As I was doing so, I felt my usual emotion of mild absurdity. I decided to imagine Overturn beating Simonsig in the Arkle. This is the expression that resulted:

(Slightly crazed, I do admit.)

And now to much more serious matters, of Prestbury Park, and the beautiful creatures we shall see there over the next few days.

My plan is to write about a few of the races over the next week that really interest me. There’s going to be a lot of racing and horseflesh on the blog from now on, so for those of you who have no interest, just pretend I really am on holiday and not posting at all.

For the rest, here are my thoughts on the Arkle, and the two great horses whom I think will dominate the great race, named after Himself, the finest National Hunt horse of the last hundred years.

Simonsig is a very thrilling chasing prospect. He has never been off the bridle this season, and has strolled to two imperious victories, gloriously unbothered by having to wade through heavy mud. He won the Neptune last year, so he has the crucial festival form; that hill holds no fears for him. According to people who know, he is scorching the turf off the gallops at home, leaving observers gaping in his wake.

On paper, nothing can touch him.

But Cheltenham is not paper. That is why there are always smoking favourites which get bowled over. I remember last year when everyone said that Boston Bob was the absolute Irish banker of the whole meeting. Suitcases of cash from over the sea were riding on his talented back. But there was a lovely young horse from Scotland called Brindisi Breeze, whom I backed at 9-1, partly because of the Scottishness, partly because I liked him, partly because I admire Lucinda Russell and she does not send horses four hundred miles for nothing, and partly because I’ve never quite believed in the Cheltenham banker.

Even this year, I would say there is only one, which is the untouchable Sprinter Sacre. Simonsig, Pont Alexandre, Quevega, and Dynaste will all be described as bankers, but I can see Overturn, The New One, Une Artiste and Captain Conan coming along and shaking up all those certainties.

This is the thrilling, edge-of-your seat thing about racing. It is the glory of the thoroughbred, in all its enduring mystery. There are so many tiny imponderables which can make a difference, from the serious business of the tactics of a race, to something as trivial as the first thing a horse sees when it gets off the lorry at the course. If something spooks a highly-bred racehorse, and it gets itself too revved up in the preliminaries, the race can be frittered away right there. (The lovely Australian mare Ortensia did this at Ascot last year.)

And so, there is the great flying grey Simonsig, for whom the sky is the limit. And there is the brilliant journeyman, Overturn, who can turn his hoof to anything. He’s been around for longer; he’s run at the very highest levels over hurdles and on the flat. He was second in last year’s Champion Hurdle, which is not too shabby, and he has now taken, rather late in life, to fences, as if they were the things he had been waiting for.

He bowls along in front, often with his ears pricked, jumping for fun. He does perhaps not quite have the white heat of Simonsig, but he has a lovely, honest exuberance which makes it look as if he is dancing over the big obstacles. He is tough and genuine, and he is going to be the first horse Simonsig has encountered over fences who will not let the grey have it all his own way.

I think, in my most stern, scientific self, that Simonsig probably has the edge. My head says he probably is a banker.

But I love Overturn with every beat of my stupid old racing heart. I think he is my favourite horse in training. He’s so bright and bonny and he loves what he does and he does not know how to run a bad race. So he is my pick. It is not a forensic decision. It’s all for love.

It’s a small bet only. And, win or lose, he still is an absolute champion in my heart.

I am keeping strictly to my new policy of not abusing copywright and putting up naughty pictures of my favourites here. Those racing photographers have a tough living to make, and I must not pinch their hard work. If you want to see the two gorgeous fellas, Simonsig is here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/dec/27/nicky-henderson-simonsig-second-week

And my best beloved Overturn is here:

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/13032012/8/photo/overturn-ridden-jockey-jason-maguire-coming-second-stan-james-ch.html

Resolutions not kept

As always, the days gallop away from me like a recalcitrant brumby. How do people keep control of the hours? Sometimes I swear I can actually hear the whoosh of time as it flies past my ear.

No lovely little bulletins on the wing, after all that. No swift aperçus, or witty asides.

I could, I suppose, tell you some of my Cheltenham thinking, that I woke this morning convinced that a treble including My Tent or Yours, Pont Alexandre, and Sprinter Sacre was the banker bet of the festival. Except I shall have changed my mind about that by tomorrow, if precedent is anything to go by. (I was slightly floored by meeting a gent today who backed My Tent or Yours at 20-1 ante-post, whilst the best price I can find is now 6-4.)

Instead, here is an entirely random collection of pictures. I was going through the archive for my HorseBack work, and I found this little collection, of sunnier days, before the horses grew their winter fur, when there still was The Pigeon, in the world. The world really is a poorer place without her in it. It still has many joys, and things to look forward to; I still wake at dawn counting off the days till Cheltenham like a child looking forward to Christmas. There is still a great deal of loving and being loved and good jokes and good food and good friendship. But even now, there is a gap, where the dear old Pidge once was.

Not at all sure how I got onto that. Was really just going to say Here are some pictures for you. Anyway, here are some pictures for you: