The turf
Ugly scenes
Robin Oakley
There isn't all that much of Neal Wilkins, Victor Chandler's lean and elegant racecourse representative with the second world war pilot's moustache, but he is the sort of man you would want on your side if the third world war were to break out unexpectedly. When violence erupted in Tattersall's enclosure at Kempton on Saturday Neal was the first man in, trying to pull off some of the pack of thugs who were kicking a prostrate figure at the bottom of the steps nearest the rails.
The fracas, one of several running skirmishes between a group who appeared to have little interest in the racing and every interest in knocking seven bells out of each other when the drink fumes had cleared sufficiently for them to focus on their target, was the ugliest thing I've yet seen on a racecourse. I have always taken pleasure in the fact that most of those I meet at the track, some of them admittedly several wings and a harp short of likely admission to the Members Enclosure when we all finally move upstairs, are nevertheless amiable coves who can cope with a drink and who do not turn aggressive even when they've done their placepot in the first, seen their big each-way bet finish fourth and watched the blonde they'd fancied in Barrie Cope's seafood bar go off with a spotty little apprentice.
It was no coincidence, of course, that last Saturday was the first blank Saturday of football's mercifully short close season. The sooner those thugs are back on the football grounds where they belong the better: we can do without them in racing. But if racing is going to have to cope with the yob culture then the racecourse authorities are either going to need more police in attendance on course or some younger, bigger security officials than those who were in evidence at Kempton on Saturday and who looked understandably shaken by the thuggery suddenly on view. Racing has until now been a sport to which I could encourage anybody to take the family and we need to keep it that way.
Mind you, there must have been something in the Thameside air on Saturday. We had violence on the course as well as on the terraces. Darren Williams, whose riding on Juwwi I praised last week, had to weave his way through a big pack once again. This time he did so less elegantly, badly hampering Literary Society, whose frustrated rider, Simon Whitworth, belted Williams with his whip. He was undoubtedly hard done by and Literary Society should be backed next time, but Whitworth was dead lucky to get away with just one day's suspension for 'improper riding'. Williams got three days for 'irresponsible riding'.
The Curse of Oakley strikes in many ways. You don't often find Henry Cecil's stable jockey free to take as many outside rides as Richard Quinn is getting and he is making the most of his outside opportunities. There was a nice tribute from his former employer after Quinn had brought home Spanish John, the winner of the opening six-furlong conditions race for two-year-olds. The well-bred winner looks to have a great deal of potential but he was coltish in the parade ring and he ran as green as a pack of watercress. Said trainer Paul Cole: 'He never raced at all, but one of the top two-year-old jockeys managed to get him home.' He added that Spanish John, who is being aimed now at the Chesham Stakes at Royal Ascot, was a nice horse who will certainly get one-and-a-half miles as a three-year-old. Spanish John, he argued, was really a seven-furlong horse, the type they might have waited with, tut if they come forward and are ready to run it is best to give them a run rather than letting them down'. Spanish John should have come on a lot from that racecourse experience and should be worth watching.
We saw a brave effort from a typically gutsy Mark Johnston performer when Virgin Soldier took the betabet On the Phone or Net handicap stakes under 9st 111b, and the sprinter Misraah, who was flying at the end after an interrupted run, should be worth a bet next time too. Henry Candy's Borders is a real flying machine and looked to have the race won a furlong out but his trainer told me afterwards that he barely lasts five furlongs. Any chance of dropping him out early on to conserve energy, I asked. No, says the trainer and jockey Chris Rutter, Borders just does not give you that option. But there must be a race to be won with him too.
I felt sorry for owner Peter Richardson in the Berkshire Handicap Stakes. Having married a daughter two weeks before, he was looking to recoup some of the costs of the nuptials with Railroader, trained by Toby Balding, and encouraged me to have a little each-way. Railroader ran with promise in the early stages but finished in the end with more in front of him than behind. Peter Richardson might care to take a look at the next few runners from Willie Muir's stable. Everyone on the racecourse bar me seemed to be on Chem's Truce in the one-mile two-furlong race, backed down from 8-1 to 13-2 favourite, and his likeable trainer was bouncing about the winner's enclosure insisting that his horses were running out of their skins despite the fact that Chem's Truce, whose form figures were 54436-4, was the yard's first winner for two months. Willie really meant it. At Lingfield that night his Tremnor was backed down from 9-2 to 9-4 and won the seller in style.
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