The turf
Not my week
Robin Oakley
It was one of those weeks. Person ore er; sons unknown having emptied my wall alt francs in Paris on Tuesday night, I g°, drenched during the enforced walk across the city to my hotel. At Sandown on Sang' day I got soaked again and managed t,, empty most of my wallet of my own accoru, into the bookies' satchels. In racing, second thoughts rarely pay off. I had travelled to the Esher course reflecting that Pat Eddery's presence on a day when the programme looked Incl appropriate for a Monday night at VW" sor, and when most of the top jockeys were at York indicated his agent's confidence that he was on a Good Thing or two. The thought of cross doubles on the EdderY mounts was in my mind. And I noted that his ride in the opener on Gipsy Rose Lee was for the currently all-conquering Brian Meehan stable. Alas, domestic duties ensured that I arrived at Sandown just after Gipsy Rose Lee had come home the winner of the first, at a remarkably generous 5-1. I had a small bet on Poppy Too, an outsider which Eddery was riding for Mick Channon in the second, which unsurprisingly failed to oblige, I then backed him solidly on John Dunlop's Piped Abroad in the third, which was touched off in a photo finish by Roger Ross- Herminius then failed to score either for the Dunlop/Eddery combination. At that point abandoning hope, common sense and the hog-roast roll which had leaked apple sauce all over my sodden blazer, I chose to ignore the money pour- ing on the Eddery ride Cortachy Castle in the fifth. The 11 times champion jockey straightened out his mount, who had jinked alarmingly coming out of the stalls, and dis- played formidable strength in driving home a near legless odds-on favourite against a last furlong challenge from my pick Taoiste. In the next, I tossed up between the Eddery mount Turgenev and Burundi and went for Burundi. Riding a well-judged tactical race, picking his ground carefully, Pat Eddery brought Turgenev home the winner from the fast-finishing Burundi. In the last, a race for three-year-old Maidens, the race-card counselled of his Mount Pure Gold 'An interesting newcom- er, especially if betting support hints at sta- ble confidence'. I chose to interpret the heavy backing for Henry Candy's Pure Gold as coincidence backers going for Eddery and reckoned that three winners had used up his luck for the day. Maybe it had but there was no luck about it as, after another race in which he picked his path and timed his effort perfectly, Eddery brought Pure Gold into the lead over a fur- long out, was headed by the battling Razor, and came again to win at 9-2. Famous for showing about as much joy finding his winners as most of us show about "riding a slug in our lettuce, the man they call the Iceman was actually seen to smile at least twice at Sandown. It was a shoe- ,."-elehing day relentless enough to blunt tne enthusiasm of the keenest apprentice. But with the rain bucketing down inces- santly the 45-year-old veteran jockey, clear- ly recovered from the back operation that forced him to take a break last year soon after the St Leger, gave every sign of enjoy- ing himself. CHe called his autobiography To Be A hampion and punters forget at their peril enormous will to win of a man who has ridden more than a hundred winners in 24 of the past 25 seasons, including 13 British Classics, and who accepts that his determi- nation to go for it in a last furlong scrim- mage is going to land him in trouble with the stewards a few times in a season. Joe Mercer, who was there to see him on Sat- urday, once called him Polyfilla' because he could fill any gap. Pat Eddery has not yet lost his ambition of beating the Lester Piggott record he has already equalled of 11 jockeys' champi- onships. If Frankie Dettori and his stables continue having a quiet season and if injury should restrict Kieren Fallon then it could conceivably still happen. Certainly I share the opinion of Turgenev's trainer Robin Bastiman that Eddery's presence on a horse is still worth three or four pounds in terms of improving its chances. And after the sheer determined professionalism of those four victories at Sandown last week- end I will not hold back next time I see a card that looks like an Eddery benefit day.
Robin Oakley is political editor of the BBC.
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