The turf
Time for enjoyment
Robin Oakley
Freddie was alarmed his stick insect might have died and had to be assured it was merely dormant. Jack had helped him- self to enough breakfast cereal to feed both the family Alsatians and Harriet gravely bore the news of the ink spilled over her mother Patricia's tracksuit. An early morn- ing post-gallops coffee with trainer Philip Mitchell and the three youngest Mitchells this week was a reminder that not all train- ing establishments have to be austere. Here is a trainer with time for his horses, time for his family and time for people.
There is a sense of continuity about Downs House, less than two furlongs from the Derby start. When I arrived in the early morning I parked beside the grave of Peter O'Sullevan's famous little Attivo. Philip was giving a leg up on the stable's current star Running Stag to work rider Derek Wilmot, who used to ride Attivo and who has been 35 years at the stable, previously run by Philip's father Cyril, now 82 and long retired in Majorca.
Mitchell senior once defined a trainer's 'No cake for me thanks — I'm a vegetarian.' task as 'seeing he doesn't screw up the good ones', and, despite some famous rows when he was doing his time as a stable lad himself, Philip rates his father as a great trainer. 'He had such panache. He could really sweeten horses, rekindle their enthu- siasm.' If his father planted one silicon chip in his brain, says Philip, it was: 'Any fool can get them fit. But you must have them mentally happy and enjoying their racing.'
There was an affectionate slap on the rump for the sprinting filly The Fugative as she clattered out of the yard. 'She was a wild child. It took us an hour to get her in the horse box. She has so much guts. What- ever we did she'd be telling us, "On yer bike".' It took an age to persuade her to enter starting stalls. But they won her con- fidence and she has been placed to win three races this season despite being put over the rails at Folkestone on her first start. 'Nothing bothers her now,' says her proud trainer. 'She's the perfect little pro- fessional.'
I remembered his Lincoln winner King's Glory. Bought at the Newmarket sales like many of his (`Go to Ireland and they see you coming and add a nought'), he had lost his confidence. A stable lass asked if she could go into the box to fetch him and it was, says Philip, love at first sight. 'They had an affair. The horse would call out to her every day when she came into the yard. It sounds silly but it was like a romance. The more they stayed together the more he blossomed.'
They ran King's Glory at the back end over lm 2f at Newmarket and he won at 33-1. The owner backed him all through the winter and with Bryn Crossley up he duly took the opening big handicap.
If he believes in his horses enjoying themselves, with or without added romance, Philip Mitchell certainly enjoys his. As we bumped up the Downs in his battle wagon he volunteered that he would not change his lifestyle even if offered £20 million to do so.
When the Mitchells were training previ- ously at Burgh Heath he grew frustrated with having their animals picked up first on the way to the races and touring for an hour before they left Epsom, so he bought his own horse-box. Nowadays he has three, and a thriving business taking horses all over Europe which helps to supplement the training income. Just as well, because there have been ups and downs. Some years in the Eighties the 40 boxes were full and he was turning away horses, plundering tracks like his favourite Fakenham, where they rarely came away without a winner or two, and taking six or eight horses up to enjoy the Scottish Circuit centred on Ayr. But after a couple of lean years in the recession there have been vacancies. Nowadays he lists his recreations as golf, shooting and surviving.
`I'm a great believer in trainers' cycles. And with eight winners this season and three in the past ten days I reckon I'm in for one of my cycles.'
Fancy Design was unlucky at Windsor. The Fugative should have more races in her and Kieren Fallon is very sweet on Running Stag, a late foal who was only three on 12 June. Second to Grapeshot in Goodwood's Predominate Stakes while still immature, he may well be aimed at a big race in America.
Amadour, winner of a maiden at Brighton last October and again this season, should stay at lm 6f and will go on jumping this winter. So will Soviet King, who won at Southwell as a three-year-old and who has been given the summer off. Red Raja, too, looks a good hurdles prospect and Downs House could be on the upswing again.
But why not go and have a look for your- self this weekend? On Sunday 27 July, Philip Mitchell, along with three other trainers with yards in sight of the Epsom grandstands, Simon Dow, Joe Naughton and Roger Ingram, is opening his yard. There will be some horse parades, starting stalls and blacksmith's demonstrations and a Shetland pony derby. All in aid of equine charities.
Robin Oakley is political editor of the BBC.
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