Moving Day

It is moving day. The small herd is going down to the new winter quarters. I get up at six, and meet the Horse Talker and her entire family, who have come to help, in the pale blue of dawn. A new moon is hovering in the sky like a silver promise and one last star glimmers beside it. I feel suddenly powerfully nostalgic for Red’s View, which we shall not see again until the spring. The beautiful mountain has watched over us so well.

There are a few loading glitches. In the end, Myfanwy the Pony has to show the posh girls how to do it. Red decides that a trailer is a very alarming place. She is used to travelling in a big lorry, with a wide ramp; this small space is not at all what she ordered. For a moment, I think all is lost. But patience, patience, one tiny step at a time - with a lot of reassurance and love, and the Pony Whisperer hopefully shaking the green bucket with the nuts in it – and suddenly, my duchess decides that she will graciously consent, and into the trailer she steps. She looks around for her small friend, who clops up into the next door stall, and off we go.

Down at the new field, Red walks down the ramp, her head high, every atom in her body gathered for novelty. She is on full predator alert. As I let her go, I expect her to explode round the field, but instead she makes off in her collected, floating trot. It is the small pony who decides it is her job to take the lead in beating the bounds, and she breaks into her roly-poly canter, with my mare following dutifully in her wake, as they inspect their new home.

‘Perhaps Myfanwy is the leader now,’ says the Pony Whisperer, thoughtfully. We ponder herd dynamics for a moment, and then go back to get Autumn the Filly, who had been most disconcerted to see us go without her.

When we bring her down, and open the trailer, Red rushes to the gate and lets out a high, plaintive neigh, as if shouting Where have you been? I find this very touching. She has bossed and dominated the filly since the moment she arrived; I had not really taken in that they had, in fact, become friends.

Once they are all together, we again expect fireworks, a bit of bronco action, some violent reaction to the move. Instead, they touch noses and fall to grazing, as if they have lived there all their lives. The Horse Talker laughs. ‘Come on,’ she says. ‘Where is the drama?’

I do errands. I go to the shops for my mother, I visit the chemist and the newsagent, I even take my library books back. I take this as a very Good Sign. A defining mark of keeping my life on track is whether I get the library books back on time.

I go back to the field, to check the horses. Red lifts her head and lets out the same wild, calling neigh that she did for the filly. She has never done that before. She whickers sometimes when she sees me, but she never shouts. I go in and stand with her and let her rest her head on my shoulder and gentle her soft neck. I feel all the love.

The new quarters are lovely, quite different from the flinging beauty of Red’s View. They are in a natural bowl, surrounded by thick forest and a hill to the north, and a high stone wall to the south. Everything is very quiet, and very still. There is no wind coming off the mountain, and no people coming and going. It feels like a hidden magical place, and we are lucky to have it. The most lovely thing is that it is three minutes’ walk from my front door. I no longer have to get in the car, doing the routine of morning and evening stables; I can go and see them whenever I want. This feels like extravagant luxury, and very good for the poor bashed heart. The horse love will see me through.

I go and look at what is in prospect for the day’s racing. The jumps are getting back into their stride, and I see lots of old friends, coming back after their summer off. There is my darling Overturn, whom I love as if he were mine, and the exciting talent of Balder Succes, and dear old Tamarinbleu, having his last season at the age of twelve. He was glorious on his day, and I put a sentimental couple of quid on him each way at 25-1, for love, for old times’ sake.

It is ten past one, and I have cried twice today for my dog. But the amazing thing is that as I write this, as I think of the new quarters, the mare just down the road, the lovely leaping horses that I shall welcome back this afternoon as I watch the races on the television, I feel actual pleasure and excitement. That’s the moment when I know it shall be all right.

The thing I fear is when grief paints everything; when each day is pulled down by the tugging memories and the ache of loss. It’s why I have been banging on about searching for the One Good Thing. I can do the pain if there is some pleasure too. Until now, that has been artificial; I have been searching for it, trying to cut it from whole cloth.

Today, it came organically. It was real. I’ll cry again before the day is through, but I shall also smile. I shall shout for lovely Overturn on his chasing debut. He’s been such a hero over the hurdles and on the flat; the thrill of watching him go over fences shall be intense. I shall miss the barking Pigeon, leaping up and down as she always does for the races. But I shall feel the joy of the glorious sight too. As long as the two can exist together, then I am all right.

 

Too many pictures to sort through, as I have to concentrate on the racing now, so here are just two for the moment:

New quarters:

Pigeon, from the archive:

Triumph and tragedy; a quick digest.

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

Strange day of mixed emotions. (Perhaps emotions always are mixed, and we humans just make a mistake in thinking they ever might be one pure thing or another.) Anyway, a very quick digest for you, because it is late and I am tired:

Love and affection for my horse.

Astonishment at the cold. Turning to bafflement at the snow.

High excitement as the thought of the day’s racing settled in. Despite reservations about the Grand National being such a strange and freakish race, the blood started to rise.

Talked to mother, talked to brother, discussed form.

Had a lovely time on Twitter, boring everyone with horse talk.

Concentrated hard on Racing Post.

Had the sheer, unadulterated pleasure of watching Simonsig and Sprinter Sacre, two of the best young horses I’ve ever seen, canter home, so full of beauty and belief that it was blinding.

My venal side was very pleased that I won rather a lot of money, especially when the third in my treble came in, and Oscar Whisky completed the party.

Suddenly panicked that the sister was about to arrive and the house was a detritus of betting guides and horse treats. Tidied up. Arranged flowers, even. Felt slightly saintly.

Joyful when the sister did arrive and noticed and appreciated.

She said, as the warm-up to the race began: ‘I thought today of Dad and how brave he was.’ He rode in the National a few times, never got farther than the third. We gave his memory a moment’s silence.

Usual thing in race – can’t bear the falls, can’t bear the cavalry charge, but am thrilled by watching the ones who really take to it, or love it already, like dear old Hello Bud, aged fourteen, who hunted round for fun under his nineteen-year-old jockey. (He finished an honourable seventh, which is remarkable, considering his age, and looked like he was loving every minute of it.)

And then the finish. For a lovely moment, we thought the wonderful Katie Walsh might do it on Seabass, but he couldn’t quite see it out, although he jumped beautifully and ran like a Trojan. We shouted for her, until her race was run, and then the marvellous Neptune Collonges won it on the nod, simply refusing to be beat.

Joy for the brave grey horse, giving Paul Nicholls his first win in the race. Joy for the young Irish jockey, Daryl Jacob, who cried tears of delight in his post-race interview.

And then the swoop of sorrow and regret as it was reported that both Synchronised and According to Pete had to be put down. I mourn dear old Synchronised, with his great white donkey face, who battled up the hill at Cheltenham to win the Gold Cup, rather against the odds, through sheer grit and perseverance.

According to Pete also had a big old white face, and was bred in Yorkshire by Peter Nelson, who runs a small newsagent; he said, of the horse, ‘And when you watch him bowling along, he's such a fine sight, seems to love doing it. He always has his ears pricked and you'd swear he has a smile on his face.’ He was a real journeyman of a horse, and he is a great loss.

Rather melancholy, as the evening fell, thinking of these fallen stars, I went up to see my own mare. She was ambly and goofy and present and real; she nudged me with affection and rested her head on my shoulder.

Horses do make and break your heart.

 

Photographs of the day.

Garden:

Red the Mare:

Her view:

The Pigeon. Are you going to play with this ball or what?:

I think it went over there:

Hill:

New shoes

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

After yesterday’s absurd length, I should like to give you some pith. It is the least you deserve.

The big news in my tiny world is that the farrier came. He is a man of great talent and decency. His father was a farrier and his grandfather a blacksmith with his own smithy. He put such a set of shoes on my mare. The tiny great-nieces and nephew came out to watch, their eyes wide as saucers as the hot shoes hissed and smoked. ‘See,’ said my friend M to the children, as the farrier got out his rasp, ‘she’s having a manicure.’

The mare stood like a statue throughout, and dozed a bit with her head on my chest. I felt very proud of her.

There was more racing today, some surprises, some wonderful horses. I shouted and roared and gave back to Mr William Hill some of the money I took off him yesterday. Suddenly, after the last, as the adrenaline ebbed, I thought fiercely of my father and wished that he were here. I always think of him at Grand National time, and this is the first year he will not be here to see it. It is amazing to me how deep the knife plunges into the heart at this thought.

I go up to see Red. She does not think of life or death, but whether I have carrots in my pockets. Luckily, I have. She ambles towards me, and then follows me back to the gate without a headcollar. This is new, and she’s done it a couple of times now, and it makes me feel as if I have won something, a prize or a lottery. It’s such a very small thing, and so very potent.

I give her the carrots in reward. She can be a bit duchessy, I have discovered. She is not that keen on crunching things, so I cut the carrots up into small, delicate pieces, which she graciously accepts. Then we commune for a bit, as a faint evening sun suffuses the far mountains. That’s better, I think; that’s all right.

Tomorrow is the National. I love it and hate it. Part of me thinks it is the greatest show on earth, and when horses take to those fences, they really do take to them. A fellow called Always Waining ran in the Topham today, which is a shorter race than the National, but over the same fences. He wins absolutely nothing on any other track, looks like a real old second-rater; then he comes to Aintree, takes one look at those fences, and turns himself into a superstar. He’s the first horse to win that race three years in a row, and even though I had not a penny on him, I cheered him home, it was such a splendid sight.

The other part of me thinks the whole thing is a freak show and yearns for a nice sensible steeplechase over normal fences and a normal distance.

But then, perhaps there is nothing that normal about any kind of race.

The main thing is that first thing, before anything else, I shall take my own little champion out in her new shoes.

 

Today's pictures:

Pigeon:

Red:

And two panoramas – of Red's view:

And the hill:

A tale of two horses; or, dreams may come true

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

Author's note: the good news is that I am feeling better after yesterday's seediness. The bad news is this means I have written an absurdly long racing post for you. So sorry about that.

 

Today, at Aintree, we may see history being made. I love it when history is made. I love it even more when it may be made by the mighty, magnificent Big Buck’s, one of the finest horses I ever saw in my life.

There is a point when superlatives become redundant. I want to get a wheelbarrow full of adjectives and shower them over this horse, but there isn’t really much point. His record, as the old sages say, speaks for itself. He is the first horse since Sir Ken, in the 1950s, to win sixteen jump races on the trot.

Not only that, but they have thrown all the superstars at him, the best horses of their generation, the quick and the brave and the good, and he just shrugs them off. At Cheltenham, last time out, the clever mare, Voler La Vedette, looked to be absolutely cruising coming over the second last. She was on the bridle, streaking up the hill. Big Buck’s had been in front for a while. Bloody hell, I thought, he’s going to get beat.

What was really interesting, watching the race over again, once the adrenaline had ebbed and I had stopped screaming my head off, is that Voler La Vedette did not stop or slow. It wasn’t that she ran out of steam. Neither did Big Buck’s put on a final spurt of speed. He did what he always does, which is shift into full Rolls Royce mode. His lengthening is so discreet that he makes it look as if everything else is going backwards, or running on the spot, whilst his awesome engine keeps powering to the line.

In that extraordinary contest, Simon Holt, one of the best callers of a race I have ever heard, suddenly shouted: ‘Big Buck’s is going to have to fight for the first time in his life’.

Yet, it was not really a fight. He had a serious challenger, certainly, and Ruby Walsh had to ask him a question or two. There have been times in the past when he has won so easily he looked as if he had gone to sleep half way through the race. Forget winning on the bridle, he won in a doze. So it is always a shock to see this titan being asked anything.

There was never a doubt that he would prevail, even with the bold mare nipping at his heels. She was finishing like a dervish, but the gelding always had her held. He pulled up, lifted his head, pricked his ears, well within himself, hardly out of breath. He was not strolling, but he was never flat to the boards.

I have said, every time I see him run, that we may never see his like again. It is racing, anything can happen. Even with a champion like this, you need luck in running. Nothing is ever nailed on. But if he wins today, I shall not only shout and scream and cry tears of joy (being never able to do a single thing by halves), I shall know for certain that he is the ultimate once in a lifetime horse.

If Big Buck’s is set to enter the halls of Valhalla, where he shall sit beside gods and kings and warriors, then the fairy tale of the meeting may be written by the astonishing Hunt Ball. I’m not sure if I have told you of him before, but his story is worth telling.

He was, reportedly, a ‘bag of bones’ when he was bought by dairy farmer Anthony Knott. Knott, who famously gets up at three each morning to milk his 260 cows, only agreed to buy the horse to support new trainer Keiran Burke, who had just started his career. Burke, who was a fine jockey, had to retire from riding after being kicked in the stomach by a young horse and rupturing his spleen. He is impossibly young, only twenty-six, and still has a very small string of horses, although what he lacks in numbers he makes up for in quality.

In other words, this motley trio is as far away from the five star operations of say, Nicky Henderson or Paul Nicholls, with their rich owners and their fleets of top-class animals. (That is not to take away anything from Nicholls or Henderson, who are brilliant men and deserve every inch of their success; it is just to illustrate how extraordinary the Hunt Ball story is.)

Hunt Ball himself, who has made up into a lovely, bonny, old-fashioned kind of chaser, started off with a handicap in the sixties. To give you a notion of how low that is, Kauto Star is rated at about 181. The handicapper gives each horse a number, according to how good she or he is, which then translates into how much weight they must carry.

The dream of the handicapper is that the ratings are so accurate that the horses pass the winning post in a straight line. This, of course, never happens, but even handicappers may dream.

Hunt Ball stared winning, at first at small tracks in small races, and then zoomed up the scale. By the time he was running at Cheltenham in March, he had gone up over eighty points in the handicap. This means, in real money, that he was judged to be eighty pounds better than when he started. It is an almost unheard–of feat. When he set off in the Pulteney Novice Chase, he was carrying twelve stone, giving away weight all round.

It was Cheltenham, possibly the toughest test of horse and rider. The lovely horse hunted round, with the sun on his back, enjoying himself, and won as he liked. He didn’t even have to be shaken up. He made the hill look like a stroll in the park. It was a beautiful sight to see.

Knott was beside himself. He is an emotional man, and has burst into tears before when being interviewed after a race. I love that about him. This time, he kept the tears at bay, but was all laughter and joy and exuberance. When asked if he would be getting up the next morning to do the cows, he said, live on television: ‘Bugger the cows’. (I think I may have told you that before, but it was my favourite moment at Cheltenham, better even than watching the machine that is Sprinter Sacre.)

Today, Hunt Ball is making a step up in class, going into a grade one race against the big boys. In the Betfred Bowl, where the horses all carry level weights, he will meet Riverside Theatre, who won at Cheltenham, Burton Port, fourth in the Gold Cup, and Medermit, who has finished in the money in every single one of his races this year. Diamond Harry and Carruthers have both won the Hennessy. It is do or die time.

If he can win, which I think he might, he will come from a starting mark of 69 at Folkestone to a grade one victory at Aintree, which is a bit like going from spam to caviar.

I would love to see him triumph so much that my fingers are shaking as I write this. In my rational head, I have a couple of reasons that I think the fairy tale is possible. Riverside Theatre, Burton Port and Medermit all had quite hard races at Cheltenham; Diamond Harry and Carruthers have yet to repeat their Hennessy form. Dear old Nacarat, the glorious grey who likes to gallop alone in front, is eleven years old, which may tell against him. By contrast, Hunt Ball won easily at Cheltenham, and is only seven.

He jumps like a stag, and really loves his racing; he has a great appetite for the game. According to his connections, he is jumping out of his skin.

The heart wants it, but the head too says the dream ending just might be possible. I’m going to have a tenner on him anyway, and at 3.05 this afternoon, you may imagine me hollering at the television screen, with the Pigeon barking encouragement. Go on, my son, we shall be roaring. Go on, my son.

 

No time for pictures now. Just a couple of my two beautiful boys. May they run well and come home safe.

 

Big Buck's, sadly uncredited. Look at the wonderful concentration from both horse and rider. And see how beautifully balanced Ruby Walsh is. I could watch that man ride all day long.

 

And here is Hunt Ball, by the wonderfully talented Edward Whitaker, for the Racing Post. Look at that horse, jumping for fun:

Cheltenham, Day Three. In which it all gets too much.

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

Here is the thing I forget, every damn year: the agony. For something that is supposed to give so much pleasure, a thing I anticipate with so much impatience and excitement, Cheltenham is curiously painful. It’s not just when horses take brutes of falls, which I find harder and harder to watch as I get older and softer, it’s actually more that the ones I love, I love so much. I want them to win not because I have had a tenner on, or because it will fulfil some double or treble, but for sheer, undilute love.

This is perfectly ridiculous. I am forty-five years old. I spent my early years with a rough, tough old racing father. He wept like a baby over horses, but he would be out booting them over fences the next day. When he was betting, he was flinty as a Russian oil billionaire. He had no sentiment at all when it came to his wallet.

I think he greatly admired a really good horse; I remember watching Moscow Flyer with him, and seeing the pleasure light up his face, but I could not tell whether it was because he really loved the horse, or whether he had had a huge punt. Perhaps he knew that, after a lifetime spent watching horses, he could not allow himself to get emotionally involved with animals that were not his responsibility.

I, on the other hand, am a Saturday afternoon observer. I know and understand racing because it’s where I came from, but I also carry the fan-like tendency of the outsider. When I see a really good horse, jumping round for fun, I see aesthetics, and emotion, and high narrative. I get carried away by the guts and the glory. There are some horses that are really, really brave. They are the ones that will go for the gap, that will give their jockey that extra, magical something on the run-in, when it seems there is nothing left to give, when they are running on fumes. You sometimes see a horse win a race through sheer heart.

Even hardened racing people will say, with admiration, of one of those, ‘he’s a real trier’. On the excellent Channel Four, you will often hear John Francome, who is not a sentimentalist at all, say: ‘he runs his heart out, every time'.

Sheer talent is very thrilling too, in quite another way. When Sprinter Sacre won on Tuesday, it was because he was so stellar that he could simply stroll over his fences, never getting out of second gear. He has not yet had to show his heart, because he is so much better than his cohort. Watching him is like observing some freakish natural phenomenon; you can see the wild in him, his ancestral herd heritage. He was meant to run, very, very fast, and that is what he does.

In the first race yesterday, quite another kind of horse gave me a different kind of thrill. Teaforthree is a lovely, old-fashioned kind of chaser, a big, bonny, bold staying horse. He is honest as the day is long. He does not have that blinding brilliance of the really top class, but he is very, very good at what he does. Most of all, he seems to love it. He hunts round, with his ears pricked, absolutely at home on the racecourse.

He was running in a four mile chase, which is absurdly long, jumping twenty-four of those vast Cheltenham fences. He went off in the lead, leaping over the obstacles with a delightful combination of poetry and accuracy. I wanted him to win for love, because he is such a fine gentleman, and because he comes from a small yard which deserves its day in the sun, and for money too, because I had a tenner on him at 8-1.

He can’t stay in front the whole way round, I thought, not for four miles. He can’t go on jumping like that.

But you know what? He just did. He never put a foot wrong, and when his smiling Irish amateur rider asked him the question after the last, he lengthened his stride like the good old fella he is, and cantered gloriously up the hill. I shouted and roared and danced for joy. It was all jubilee, for that moment, in my house.

But the problem with all this is that I care far, far too much. When the bright novice Grand Crus got beat, I took it personally. When the brilliant and brave Sizing Europe could only finish second, after a very messy Champion Chase, I felt a raging fury. This was only compounded by a horrid cavalry charge of a hurdle race where there were three hideous falls. I suddenly felt disgusted with the whole business.

This idiot level of caring makes the beautiful victories much keener and sweeter. The other side of the coin is that when the one I love gets beat, or has no luck in running, or just does not run his race, as horses sometimes do not, I have a crushing, crashing sense of disappointment, which can linger for the rest of the day.

Today, Big Buck’s lines up for the World Hurdle. I want him to win so much that I can hardly speak. The wanting is so acute it is actually making me grumpy. I think: I’m not sure I can even watch the race. It will be too terrifying, too much agony. This is supposed to be a lovely afternoon at the races. Yet I shall be pacing about, literally or metaphorically hiding behind the sofa. I shall be quite tempted to leave the house altogether, and go for a nice walk with the Pigeon until the race is over.

The whole thing is too absurd for words. I cannot explain it. A shrink would probably have a field day with it. I sometimes wonder what it must be like to be one of those sanguine, calm people, who can let life roll off them. I know they exist. (It’s like the Organised People, whom I also observe with awe and wonder.)

On days like this, I rather yearn to know how they do it. A shrug of the shoulders, a wry smile, a philosophical sigh, and the thing is done. How very, very lovely that must be.

 

The wonderfully collected Teaforthree, on the far side, by Mark Cranham for the Racing Post:

And with a very happy JT McNamara, coming into the winning enclosure, by Getty Images:

The power and the glory that is Big Buck's, photograph uncredited:

If you are new to the blog, and have no idea about that mighty horse, and would like to know more, I have written about him before, here and here.

And now I really am stopping.

I should not give you any tips at all, after the drubbing I took yesterday, and today is such a difficult betting day that I am mostly going to keep my cash in my pocket. But I really do like Noble Prince for the very competitive Ryanair at 2.40. Although you could make a really good case for any one of eight of them. I'd love to see Somersby run a big race for Henrietta Knight too.

I have a tiny feeling for Cristal Bonus in the Jewson, but only a five quid at 5-1 feeling. Donald McCain's horses are on fire, and the favourite, Peddler's Cross, will run well.

Big Buck's is not a betting thing. He is 2-1 on. This means you have to put two pounds on to win one. Also, this is the toughest opposition he has faced yet, strength and depth. The Willie Mullins' horses are fancied, and Oscar Whisky, trained by the on fire Nicky Henderson, who had FOUR winners yesterday, is a terrifying danger. Just hope, and watch, and enjoy the brilliance.

If he does win, I shall cry shameless tears of joy.

The elephant in the room

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

Yesterday, when I wrote the post about Cheltenham, there was a huge great lumbering elephant sitting, glowering, in the corner of the room.

It was that three horses died.

I did not know how to tell you that. It was so out of kilter with the anticipation of the day, and the joys of the great feats of heart and endurance. It was, I suppose, a jarring reminder that with joy comes sorrow.
After watching the bold young horse, Sprinter Sacre, bowl round Cheltenham as if he wanted to do nothing else in the world, there was the ghastly sight of seeing the lovely ScotsIrish pull up with a broken hind leg, and have to be destroyed. (Destroyed is a terrible word; I saw one piece where it was described as euthanized, which is the more accurate term. Destroyed though, is the word that the horse people use; the vet puts down the horse with something called a humane destroyer. Despite the ugly word, it is quick and painless.)

In the race where the victory of the tremendous, honest, talented Hunt Ball sent his owner, the farmer Anthony Knott, into transports of delight, so that he was laughing and crying and lost for words, Educated
Evans fell, and had to be put down.

Perhaps saddest of all, the glorious veteran, Garde Champetre, broke a front leg and was also put down. The Older Brother was standing in the middle of the course, right where it happened. He said that Nina Carberry, who has ridden Garde Champetre for the last eight years, and knows and loves the horse like no one else, was so distraught when she jumped off that she was bashing her fist against the rails in despair.

All horses, in any walk of life, suffer risk. They can get cast in their box, just mooching around in the stable at home. They can die in the field. Although jumping carries more risk, the irony was that both ScotsIrish and Garde Champetre suffered their injuries on the flat. There were remarkably few fallers yesterday, but what those two horses show is that all it takes is for an animal to put down wrong when running, and a leg can go. I saw it happen, shockingly, at Ascot this summer, when Rewilding died in a flat race.

Some parts of the media like to whip up a storm and call it rank cruelty. I have a problem with that, because of growing up in a racing household. My father rode and trained racehorses horses for most of his life; he was not a cruel man. So there is a disconnection between the furious descriptions I read, and the life I knew. The Animal Rights people, who would like racing to be banned altogether, have much more consistency on their side, because they are as furious about zoos and cheap chicken and factory farming as they are about racing.

I’m not sure I can make tremendous sense of it. You can argue that there is no walk of life without risk, unless you wrap yourself in cotton wool and never leave the house. I have argued that there is an inconsistency in making an outcry against racing, where a tiny proportion of animals suffer an untimely death, whilst the public generally accept battery chickens, which is wholesale nastiness. This is a rational argument, but does not quite touch the emotive heart of the thing.

I think of the great horses who ran for season after season; Desert Orchid raced for ten years, over all kinds of fences, and died a natural death at the great old age of twenty-seven, after a long and happy retirement.

All the arguments will be waged, with passion and rage. There are good points on both sides; I’m not sure it is an easily clear-cut case from either angle.

What I do know is that for all the brilliance and the beauty and the joy, the shadow of loss swooped over Prestbury Park yesterday. There will have been three yards last night with a dark and empty box. The people who looked after those horses were not ruthless barbarians; they loved their charges, and will feel a terrible grief.

I was with my father, years ago, at Aintree, when he lost a horse. He was a brave fella called Earthstopper, and he died of a heart attack. I saw the inconsolable sorrow in my old dad. He was not a brute, but he knew there is a tough core to the racing life. I never spoke to him about the rights and wrongs. He was not a contemplative man. I think he might have said, with hard simplicity: these things happen. You mourn them, and you go on.

There are people who will think that is not good enough, and they might be right.

I shall watch the racing again today, slightly chastened. The blood will rise again, the thrill will come. I shall look forward to seeing if the exciting novice Grand Crus is as brilliant as I think he might be. The crowds will roar the champions up the hill.

After all the arguments pass, as they always do, we are left with the simple fact of the thing. Three good horses were lost, and the least I can do is mark their passing.

Educated Evans, photograph by the PA:



Garde Champetre, by David Davies for the PA:



Nina Carberry, after winning on him at Cheltenham past, photograph by the PA:



ScotsIrish, photograph uncredited:



When I sat to write this, I thought of making a case. There is a strong defence to be made for racing; I've done it before. But in some ways, there is no point to that. You are intelligent, thoughtful readers; you know what you believe. This was not the moment for a debating chamber. And it might sound like the thin noise of special pleading.

In the end, I just wanted to say the thing; to tell what happened, to acknowledge the sadness, to make a tiny RIP.

First day of Cheltenham, interrupted

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

I was sitting down to write the blog after an extraordinary first day at Cheltenham, when – smack, shudder, sizzle, flash – all the lights went off, with a very scary flickering effect. The speakers attached to the computer made the most terrible wailing noise. I went outside. There was a fire in the beech avenue. A tree branch had come down, scythed through our power line, which was severed and slithering free on the ground. One of the cows was electrocuted. It was awful.

So, no computer, no lights, no nothing. I pulled myself together, lit all the candles, and gathered the family around. The Younger Niece is here, with the Man in the Hat, and the Landlord and The International Traveller drove down, and we drank Guinness and built up the fire and mourned the poor old cow.

The amazing men from the Scottish Hydro Electric drove out like princes to the rescue, and put up arc lights, and worked all night to fix the thing. So, suddenly, the power is back on, and I must give you a blog.

I wanted to tell you the whole story of the day, but I am too tired now.

There were many extraordinary moments. Perhaps the greatest was watching the young novice, Sprinter Sacre, saunter round the difficult course at Cheltenham as if he were out for a training gallop.

Some people said he would not go up the hill. He made the hill look like it was for amateurs. He never came off the bridle. He is a big, bonny, old-fashioned looking sort of horse, dark bay, with big ears and an honest head. He is the great, shining star of the future. When the mighty Kauto retires, we have another champion to make the hairs on the back of the neck stand up. He has so much raw talent that it is like watching an elemental force of nature.

Perhaps the happiest story was in the last. There is a lovely horse called Hunt Ball, who started off the season at a very low rating, in the sixties. To give you a comparison, Kauto Star is rated at 180. Hunt Ball is trained by a young trainer, in a small yard. His owner is not a storied aristocrat or a moneyed plutocrat; he is a dairy farmer from Dorset, who gets up at four every morning to see to the cows. He is famous for whooping and crying in the winning enclosure; once, he even leapt on the horse himself, and rode him back to the winner’s circle. (The stewards crossly fined him one hundred pounds. He didn’t care. The crowd didn’t care. The horse appeared to love it.)

Since the autumn the lovely, honest Hunt Ball has gone up 73 points. This is almost unprecedented; that much improvement is quite stellar. The thought today was that the handicapper had caught up with him; he was going over the two and half miles with twelve stone on his back. I had a heart over head bet of a tenner, at 8-1. That is a hell of a top weight, to lug over those huge fences, and up that unforgiving incline. I backed him through a sheer want for him to win.

The horse jumped like a stag all the way round, eased into the lead at the second last, and galloped home, ears pricked, to the absolute delight of everyone watching.

It was not one of the championship races; it was the final contest on the card, when some people have gone home. But the exhilaration of the connections was so infectious, and  everyone there seemed to know this rags to riches story, so that he got the biggest cheer of the day by far. The good Cheltenham crowds recognised true loveliness when they saw it. They rose as one; the farmer threw his arms in the air with sheer joy; the horse lifted his head in salute. It was one of the finest things I ever saw.

Hunt Ball, by Tom Jenkins for the Guardian. Very happy owner on the right:

Glorious picture by Edward Whitaker:

Sprinter Sacre, on his way to dominate the Arkle:

Red the Mare is on the road. Arrives Thursday. Can hardly believe it. It is all equines with me, just now.

In which I dream of Cheltenham

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

I can only apologise for two whole days with no blog. The road really wore me out this time. Sometimes the drive is dreamy and relatively easy; sometimes there is a moment at Dundee when I genuinely think I am not going to be able to make that last eighty miles and I shall have to call the nice people at the AA to tow me home. I really do not know how lorry drivers and commercial saleswomen do it.

Today, I attempted some kind of re-entry. There is no time for unpacking or any of that malarkey; my car remains filled with books, clothes, a saddle, and a selection of blankets, on which the poor Pigeon dozed on the long drive home, like the Princess and the Pea. (She really does hate travelling now, in her old age, and lies with a most grumpy and resigned look on her noble face.)

I did work. I spoke, in an organised manner to co-writer and agent. I pitched five different ideas for future projects. One of them, the one I most wanted and least expected to meet with approval, was greeted with interest and delight.

The Younger Brother called on the Skype. We shouted at each other over the computer, across the thousands of miles from the Far East to the Scottish East.

I thought, most of the day, about Cheltenham. I want so badly to write something stirring and glorious about it, here. Alistair Down did a lovely piece in the Racing Post a few days ago about the glory and the guts. I wanted to stir your blood and excite your viscera. (Really, if I cannot excite your viscera, I do not know what I am here for.)

But I’m a bit out of words after all that work and all that pitching. I can't quite summon the proper prose to give you a sense of what the thing is all about.

It’s like Christmas and Easter all rolled into one, which is a big, fat, rolling cliché, but true, all the same. I will not be able to sleep tonight for excitement.

Why is it so marvellous? It’s because of the crowd, of the magical setting, of the test of the course. Cheltenham is a rolling, undulating track, with a tough hill at the end. There are other, flatter tracks, where horses can get away with a little lack of stamina or heart. At Cheltenham, any weakness is exposed. To win at the festival, when all the best horses in Britain and Ireland are lined up, trained to the moment, requires something extra, something special, a combination of talent and determination and courage.

It is the fact that all the heroes are there: the finest horses, the great trainers, the most brilliant jockeys. It is the lovely, dreamy fact that even in that stellar gathering, the small operations get their chance. I’m not really sure why this is, perhaps just a matter of probability, with so many races being run in such a short time. Whatever it is, there is always a moment, each year, when an obscure trainer who does not have bags of cash and a string of equine stars, who probably gets up at five each morning to do the mucking out herself, who may have to see to the sheep or the cows before he looks to the horses, will have a shining moment in the sun. There is a keen sense of sporting chance this week, which appeals to the great British sense of fairness.

There is also the soaring beauty – of the place itself, of the animals who run there. The horses are just coming into their spring selves; some of them are as fit as they have ever been in their lives. Because of the sense of occasion, they come with their manes plaited and their tails brushed and their hooves oiled and their coats gleaming with health and promise. There are always a few vanity runs, one with little hope whose owners just yearn for a runner at the festival, and there is no law against that. But most of them will be the best of their cohort, the ones who are finely put together, who know how to jump and gallop and stay. This is not a selling plate at Thirsk, there are no mugs here. These horses are tested and tried.

It’s a bit of a favourites meeting this year. There are some defining superstars – Quevega, the brave, fast mare who carries the heart of Ireland; Hurricane Fly, a great Irish hurdler; Grand Crus, a young, brilliant chaser in his first season over fences; and the wild, unstoppable Sprinter Sacre, another novice, who races with all the fervour of a bronco on a high plain.

The majestic Big Buck’s is going for his fourth World Hurdle. Regular readers will know of my love for him. If he wins this week, he will equal the extraordinary record set by Sir Ken in the fifties, of sixteen victories in a row.

Although I hate betting on favourites, especially those that are odds on, even though my old dad always taught me to look for value, for the canny outsider, I want all those champions to win. Because I must have a bet, I have put them all into various complicated accumulators and yankees and patents and trebles. My William Hill account is ticking and humming.

And then, of course, there is Kauto Star. Today, the announcement was made that, after those terrifying doubts of last week, he will run in the Gold Cup. After my initial, streaming delight, I had to start preparing myself for the possible anti-climax. It is Cheltenham, anything could happen. He is twelve years old, and no horse that age has won the race in over forty years. The odds are that Long Run, his youthful challenger will have his day. But oh, oh, I dream the dream. I dream it with everything I have.

There was a lovely moment, when the news was announced, when Kauto was trending on Twitter worldwide. For a moment, he was the most famous horse in the entire world. My favourite tweet was from a Spanish source. It just said ‘Kauto Star – en plena forma’.

I too, am on plena forma. It’s CHELTENHAM. It’s my best damn week of the year. There may not be enough good words to describe it, but just imagine your most thrilling, giddy, glorious, absurdly delightful thing, and double it.

 

I seem to have managed to lose my camera battery charger, so there are no pictures today. Here are a few lovely horse shots, to get you in the mood.

Two lovely Kauto shots, both uncredited:

Big Buck's, being schooled by Ruby Walsh, wonderfully shot by the David Davies for the PA:

The green bowl of Prestbury Park, being watered in advance of the races, taken by the brilliant Alan Crowhurst for Getty Images:

I shall think of my old dad all week. He won the Kim Muir in 1959 on a horse called Irish Coffee. I wish I could find a photograph of it to show you, but I can't. You shall just have to imagine the old fella, with his baggy, white, old-fashioned breeches, his slightly cowboy-ish riding style, the wild, determined grin with which he rode, his faintly gritted teeth, roaring up the hill to the finishing post. I shall imagine the amazed delight, the shouts of the crowd, the vindicated exhaustion, the sheer, brilliant victory.

He did some nutty, eccentric, inexplicable things in his life. But he did some really, really great things too, and that was one of them.

Giving up

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

I have, finally, Given Up. I hate and loathe giving up; would much rather bash on. I rather despise the fact I do not have that much physical stamina. I am hoping that is going to change once I get all fit and my muscles harden from riding every day. So, I have conceded defeat to the aches and pains and heavy head and eyes like hot boiled eggs and general malaise and light-sensitivity.

I love all the Dear Readers being doctor. I am now choosing between low grade virus, too much excitement, over-tiredness, Vitamin B12 deficiency, and low blood pressure. Oddly, I have always had very low blood pressure, sometimes the doc has to take it twice, she can’t believe it is so low. I am oddly proud of this, although it is nothing to do with me. But I like the idea of not being in the danger zone for stroke and heart attack. Much better low than high.

Whatever the thing is, I have had to chuck a meeting with publisher and co-writer, since I cannot get down the stairs, let alone on a train. I am quite grumpy about the whole thing. I am typing this in bed, with a dozy Pigeon by my side.

I was worrying about the blog, since my plan is to sleep all day, so I can be well for Saturday, when I drive back north. I must be fit for the five hundred and fifty miles.

Luckily, one of the Dear Readers left a quite enchanting comment yesterday, about Nijinsky. It is such a lovely story that I am going to put it up here for today’s blog. This is very naughty, since I have not asked permission. I am trusting that the Reader will not mind if I share with the group.

This is what she wrote:

I met Nijinsky once when he was an old fellow. Had gone to the farm to visit another stallion and my guide that day was an elderly stud groom just off retirement named Clay Arnold. It was a quiet morning and I was by myself, so Clay took out several of the big names for me to look over (quite nice, as I hadn't a dime and clearly was not a potential client - he must have seen that I just loved 'em.

At the end, as I got ready to leave, he said, "Wait a moment, you can't go until you've see the best of them all. I'm not supposed to, but it's nearly time for him to go to his paddock." In a few minutes he came back with a dark bay stallion who was obviously a senior citizen (he was 24 at the time), but still a looker.

He walked pretty slowly, as old aches had caught up with him, but he had that indefinable air of greatness about him. They were so touching, Clay and Nijinsky, two old campaigners, very quiet and gentle with each other. They're both gone now, but I still have the photo I shot of them and have never forgotten the moment.

Nijinsky was everyone's champion, but he was one man's best friend.

Isn’t that the best story you have ever heard? I love it. Thank you, Bird.

Here are some glorious pictures of the old champion. Still can't quite believe he is the grandsire of my lovely Red:

Lovely to see old Lester in action. The photograph is uncredited, but I think that is Pat Eddery behind him. My guess is that it's the Derby. Wish I knew what that second horse was though.

Another delightful shot:

This is my mare's great-grandsire, the mighty Northern Dancer. Another uncredited photograph, but isn't it rather extraordinary?

Their little descendant, with her rather flashy bay friend:

My very own Northern Dancer:

Some tulips, because you really have had to put up with an awful lot of horse pictures lately:

And a really glorious picture of Kauto Star working at home, taken yesterday by Edward Whitaker, for the Racing Post. Whitaker has always taken absolutely luminous pictures of Kauto Star, I think he has a feeling for the horse. The mighty fella on the right is Big Buck's. So, not so shabby:

The news on the great horse continues good. Now I start to think of serious reality. Even if he does get fit enough, he is still twelve years old, and no twelve-year-old has won the Gold Cup for something like fifty years. (The Older Brother would know the exact stats; he has a steel trap brain for racing facts.) I saw a picture of Long Run on the gallops two days ago, and he looks magnificent. If Grand Crus runs, all bets are off. I still think that dear old Midnight Chase might run a big race, if he gets a bit of luck in running. He stays all day and loves Cheltenham; that hill has no fears for him.

But look at the determination on that face on the left. As I always say, he might be a handsome devil, but he is no show pony. He is tough and true and honest as the day is long. I think he deserves his chance. My heart and my cash are on him anyway. It's a loyalty thing. It's an if wishing could make it so thing.

And now I am going to have a damn good sleep and see if I can't feel better.

The Wheel of Fortune turns

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

Just as I sat down to write the blog last night, all filled with The Cousin’s birthday, I saw the news on Twitter that Kauto Star had suffered a fall in training, and was doubtful for the Gold Cup.

I felt as sick and sorry as if it had been my own little mare, the one I have been riding each morning for the last two weeks. It’s an odd, dual feeling. There is the crashing regret that I think anyone might feel when a great athlete they admire undergoes an injury. It’s a sadness from afar. The champion exists on the mountain top; I only watch from the foothills.

But because I love horses, and because I have been living with horses here in the south, and because I am growing increasingly connected to one horse, also a gentle thoroughbred, there was an extra empathy, a disproportionate whack to the stomach. When I read that he had fallen in training, I could almost hear the crunch, feel the heavy thud of a half a ton of horse hitting the earth.

The birthday was still going on, when I got the news. I did not write anything here, or say anything to the Cousin. It was her special day, and I did not want to put the mockers on it. I attempted to call in the perspective police: it is only a horse, whom I have never met.

But the melancholy lingers. He may shrug off the stiffness, get fit enough for his final blue riband. After the first shock and sorrow, my raging optimistic instinct kicked in. He’s a horse in a generation; he’s as brave and bold and strong as the steeliest lion; he has a heart the size of twenty houses.

My fantastic, romantic, narrative sense went into overdrive: this will be the story of the century. Not only was he written off at the beginning of the season, not only was he considered too old, past his prime, but just at the moment when people thought he could break all records by winning his third Gold Cup, this happened. If he could come back from this and storm up that hill, then I never need watch a race again. It would be every fairy tale in the world, rolled into one, glorious, impossible story. People would talk to their children and grandchildren of it, for years to come.

Then, the low, rational, realistic mind asserted itself. Horses come back from falls all the time. The racehorse, despite being a finely bred creature, is also tough as nails. But, like humans, they are tough when they are young. A seven-year-old can get bashed about a bit, and recover quickly, the scars of battle healing, the stretches and strains knitting back to wholeness. At the age of twelve, which is sure veteran country, a horse is slower to get back on his feet. Two weeks is not long. It may be the end of the road for this fine, brilliant creature.

The thing which has marked Kauto Star this season is his joy in racing. I have watched his victories at Haydock and Kempton over and over, not just because he was magnificent, but because he was having so much fun.

I’m not sure I ever saw an animal delight in his galloping and jumping so much, not since the wild days of Desert Orchid. It sounds fanciful, but I have wondered whether he beat Long Run because he broke the younger horse’s heart, just a little. It was something in the joyous, dancing way that Kauto ran his last two races, which even the determination and gift of Long Run could not match.

Even if they could, by some miracle, get Kauto Star fit enough for the last day of the festival, the danger is that that rampant joy would be gone. There would be the sense memory of his training fall, instead of the muscle memory of the soaring leaps that won him the prize last time out. He is an extraordinary horse, but he is also a sensible horse; he might just decide, quite rightly, that the giddy fun was no longer there. He might take it easy, take it slow, be cautious and careful. The heedlessness might be gone.

It is hard to judge the mind of an animal, especially one which owes so much to its wild, herd heritage. Anthropomorphism is bred of human sentiment, of category errors; it is also not useful, in this context. On the other hand, anyone who has ever worked with horses will tell you that they remember. Even if Kauto is back to fighting strength, which would be a training feat in itself, will he remember the dull Friday at home when he tumbled, or the arching triumph in December, when he made history?

He owes us nothing, not one damn thing. He has done more than any other horse in the last twenty years. He has thrilled and soared.

He has made me cry, laugh, shout, roar, stamp and jump. He has made the Pigeon bark her head off and shoot vertically into the air. He has won me ready cash.

Cheltenham this year will not be the same without him; it will be a drabber, poorer place. (Oddly, I sometimes think of the world like that, without my old dad in it, and he was a little bit of a racing legend too, in his own way.)

If it should be time for the auld fella to go out in the field with the sun on his back, it is the very least he deserves. Even if my fairy tale heart whispers, oh, oh, if only.

A couple of lovely Kauto pictures for you -

Winning The Gold Cup:

Photograph uncredited, from Sportinglife.com.

Look at those front legs. Hard to believe that a horse that can do this could make a schooling error. But they are fallible creatures, not machines:

Photograph by the Press Association.

With his trainer, Paul Nicholls. That man would never let harm come to that horse. Whatever decision he makes will be the right one, for the right reasons:

My own daily ride. Not quite as grand, but very, very dear:

She doesn't look bad, does she, considering she's just come out of the muddy field?

Some garden colour:

The Pigeon, doing her sphinx number:

Trotting on:

Then turning, and looking quizzically, as I dawdle behind, as if to say Are you coming?

Just spoke to my mother. Her fervent wish is that Kauto Star will now retire, and we can remember the glory days, and spend future weeks watching old victories. I sort of know she is quite right, but I can't help but dream of one, last, glorious time.