Happy coincidences
Robin Oakley
It doesn't always land buttered-side down in life. Obliged by social engagements to give Ascot's Shergar Cup a miss on Saturday and to do my racing in Leicester last Sunday instead. I went to bed on a rainy Saturday night in nearby Rutland and woke to find it was still chucking it down. But fortune favoured the foolhardy. As I drove to the Oadby course the rain finally relented. I was soon well fortified by the best bacon bap I have encountered outside Mrs Oakley's kitchen and what turned out to be not the single doughnut I would have got down south for the same price but a whole bagful of hot sugary specimens. I did try offering the spares round, but ladies of an impressionable age weren't having anything to do with free sweets from a man with a Press badge. They're clearly brought up properly in the Midlands.
I had just a single bet in mind on my way to the course, having reckoned that Lambourn trainer Michael Blanshard's Patsy's Double might be suited by the stiff six-furlongs in the Absolutely Fabulous Showcase Handicap. When I encountered Michael by the fish bar (this time he was eating, not me: there is a limit) he reminded me that Patsy's Double had run in the 2,000 Guineas and he sounded happy about the going. Had there been any doughnuts left by then I would have offered him one, and I have to admit I did double my bet.
It then became an instinctive thing, a growing certainty that I was going to be in the money, as the omens clocked up. I know coincidence betting is ridiculous but I had earlier encountered the marvellous Joanna Lumley 'Patsy' lookalike who was doing her stuff around the parade ring and the winner's enclosure with a hairdo which would have afforded lodging to several million little honey-makers and with a vodka bottle to hand. After Matthew Henry had won the first race comfortably on Ed Dunlop's Night Aurora, substituting for the Mlmarooned Richard Hughes, she huskily offered him a weighing-room rubdown. And when little David Allan, a 71b claimer, won the second, it looked for a minute as if she was going to tuck him under her arm and teeter off with him in her zebra stilettos.
That was one Patsy's Double. The second double was provided by the horse's owners, who are Pat and Patsy Buckley. And then, by sheer accident, I found myself handing over the additional bet to a bookie trading as Pat Cash. After all that it just had to be. Two furlongs out the Pats and Patsies around me in the stands were a little hushed as the speedy Como blazed away in front. But the omens were with us. Patsy's Double stuck to his task and soon the Blanshard brigade were whooping their horse home as he wore down the leader in the final furlong. Rider Fergus Sweeney confirmed afterwards that the stiff track had suited Patsy's Double. 'He's not got a fantastic turn of foot but I knew he'd keep plugging away and the further we went the better it was.' Michael hasn't found Patsy's Double easy to place but is convinced that he's a Group Three horse. The colt has been close enough to Mozart to make that a reasonable claim. My only sadness was discovering that Patsy's Double had drifted out to 12-1 at the off. Having seen him as low as 7-1 at one point I had thought I had been clever in twice taking 10-1. But I am not going to fuss about missing two points off the price of a double-figure winner.
Richard Hughes, second to Patsy's Double in the end on Rasoum, had consolation for that, and for the first-race winner he missed when he rode a double on Morning's Minion for Roger Charlton and on Second Affair for Jedd O'Keeffe. The tall jockey who has been such a star of this season was having his first ride for the Leyburn trainer, formerly Micky Hammond's assistant, and it clearly won't be the last he will be offered. He rode a copybook race, waiting in front with an easy early pace and then turning the screw when it mattered. Tactics had been left to him and once again he showed that he has that precious clock in his head. 'A fantastic ride,' said the trainer, overjoyed that the game four-yearold, who deserved her success, had got her head in front at last after four seconds in her last six races.
I was pleased for the enthusiastic Jedd, and for his pretty apprentice Lindsey Rutty who was leading up Second Affair. She just happened to be standing by as I approached the Tote window, uncertain whether to back Second Affair or the Queen's horse High Spot. The nice smile I got when I wished her luck clinched it for me. I nearly went back for another bag of doughnuts afterwards. She looked as though she could do with a little feeding up. Jedd now has 20 horses in the yard, ranging from sprinters on the flat to three-mile chasers. Which way does he want to go? Will his become primarily a flat stable or a National Hunt yard? 1 want to prove my versatility,' he said, 'To be frank I don't know which way it will go. I'm passionate about both codes. But today the flat just has the edge....
Previous page
