The turf
Young talent
Robin Oakley
While the crème de la creme of British racing was at Churchill Downs to watch our heroes go down, we ordinary mortals made do with Sandown Park on a glorious sunnY afternoon summed up for me by the Press room colleague who declared after the Paul Nicholls-trained Court Melody had won the fourth: 'He needed a winner. He hasn't had one for ten minutes.' You could tell who hadn't backed that one. On a day when the Nicholls stable sent out ten runners to score seven wins and two seconds, assistant trainer Tim Cox was grinning from ear to ear. So too was stable jockey Timmy Murphy, surprisingly demot- ed in favour of the talented young claimer Joe Tizzard. Murphy, riding like a man inspired this season, has been deservedly picking up a range of top class spares and he gave the perfect answer to cronyism, which operates in racing as well as in poli- tics, by riding a Sandown four-timer on Laredo, Court Melody and Mr Strong Gale for the Nicholls yard and on Chai-Yo for Jim Old, demonstrating in the process every facet of the jump jockey's art.
What was especially impressive about the Nicholls winners was that all three were making their seasonal debut. Other trainers may send their runners to the racecourse for the final stages of their preparation, not the young master of Manor Farm Stables, who makes sure they have done enough on his stiff uphill gallop to 'run their races out. It was 171 days since Mr Strong Gale's last run, 196 since Court Melody had seen a course and 337 for the unbeaten novice Laredo, who now looks like a bargain at the 20,000 guineas paid to secure him from the Noel Chance yard after a bout of leg trouble.
I had gone to Sandown partly to keep an eye on young riding talents who will rival Joe Tizzard, notably in the shape of Sea- mus Durack and Jamie Goldstein. But it was another young rider who caught the eye. Miriam Francome's approbation after he had given Out'N'About a tidy ride into second place in the first encouraged me to increase my bet on Myosotis in the handi- cap hurdle despite knowing neither the trainer, Peter Hiatt, or the 71b-claiming rider Mr Sam Stronge. Given a cool, unflustered ride, Myosotis came home the winner by six lengths at 5-1. And after the attendant scribes had sorted out which of the figures in the unsaddling enclosure was Peter Hiatt he revealed how well Sam Stronge had settled Saucy Nun for him on a previous ride and how he'd been willing therefore to give him a mount declined by Richard Johnson in favour of another run- ner in the race.
Myosotis himself, he said, had been a right monkey on the flat, but he certainly went well enough for his young rider, who is the son of the former jockey Robert Stronge and, like Richard Johnson, yet another in the David Nicholson academy of young riders. More regular race-watchers than me pay tribute to his character as well as his riding. We will hear more of him. I hope we will hear more too of the amiable Mr Hiatt, who has just eight horses in his Banbury stables and whose first winner this was since January after a long string of sec- ond places.
Watch out too for Jim Old's Chai-Yo, a winner under the unstoppable Timmy Mur- phy of the Kingston Handicap Hurdle. He comfortably beat off Ian Balding's Papua and the well-handicapped Bright Novem- ber despite carrying topweight of 12 stone in ground officially described as good to soft but which some said was riding like Christmas pudding. Chai-Yo never won last season, encountering a bog at Kemp- ton in the Christmas Hurdle and being the first in his afflicted stable to cough after the Kingwell. Jim Old, who was happy with the going, told us he has never lost faith in Chai-Yo being a very good horse and in races like the Sandown contest where something makes it a good gallop he will surely win again.
Finally, readers may recall an anecdote I relayed from Dick Hem at the O'Sullevan awards about trainer Syd Flavell, who allegedly responded to chiding from an absentee owner about his long telegrams by sending one which simply went `SF,SF,SF,SF'. When pressed on their next meeting for an explanation he was alleged to have replied: 'Easy: Strongly fancied, slipped and fell, see you Friday, Syd Flavell'. Noting that I don't like 'sanitised' racing, Mr McCalmont of Newbury chides me with sanitising anecdotes. So here you are: in Mr McCalmont's father's version of the Syd Flavell story the initials stood for: `Started, farted, slipped and fell. Shot the f*****, Syd Flavell'. I wouldn't want any of my racing friends to think I have been pay- ing attention to BBC memos.
Robin Oakley is political editor of the BBC.
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