The turf
Punter prejudice
Robin Oakley
When Jeffrey Bernard once compli- mented Fred Winter on how well his hors- es looked, the maestro's response was, `Well, Jeffrey, they don't stay up all night drinking vodka and playing cards.' I am not so sure about the nocturnal lifestyles of one or two that I have been backing lately. But what we punters do sometimes forget is what an achievement it is getting a horse regularly to the racecourse at all, let alone winning races.
Courtesy of Tom Clarke, the sagacious editor of the Sporting Life, I was racing at Ascot's pre-Christmas meeting with Henry Kelly, between carol concerts, and it was the turntable's most intrepid punter who prompted us to note that virtually all the winners of last season's top races are now hors de combat for the current campaign. Cheltenham Gold Cup winner Mr Mulligan has been prematurely retired through injury and the other two Cheltenham heroes, record-time Champion Hurdle vic- tor Make A Stand and Martha's Son, win- ner of the Queen Mother Champion Chase, are both out with leg injuries. So too is Lord Gyllene, an easy winner of the Grand National.
Last year's Hennessy winner Coome Hill has not looked the same horse in this cam- paign, though 1996 King George VI winner One Man, who could have won the race again by the time this appears, and the Whitbread victor Harwell Lad, are still with us.
It was Henry Kelly too who pointed out an intriguing statistic. If you take the five trainers whose entrants this season, backed to a £1 level stake, would have given you the biggest profit, they are Mary Reveley (£77), Jenny Pitman (£47), Venetia Williams (£43), Paul Nicholls (£37) and permit-holder Susan Nock (£35). The chaps had better look to their laurels. Or is there a punter-prejudice working here, enabling one to get better odds on a horse trained by a woman?
On the man-woman thing I noticed more mobile phones in use at Ascot than ever before. And, sure enough, there were two men swapping notes over whose was the most efficient and compact. As Neil Kin- nock remarked the other day, mobile phones are the only subject on which you will get men boasting about who's got the smallest.
But back to that day's racing. Harwell Lad, who beat his better-fancied stable companion Flyer's Nap into second place in the Whitbread, is a notorious rogue who sought to pull himself up half way round in an earlier race this season. Perhaps that is why West Country trainer Robert Alner again saddled two for the Betterware Cup at Ascot, running the other ex-pointer Cool Dawn as well. Despite Harwell Lad appear- ing to try his usual tricks again on the sec- ond-circuit amateur, Rupert Nuttall kept him up to his work and the two Alner hors- es drew clear of a competitive field. In the hands of Andy Thornton, recommended a few weeks ago in this column as a man to have on your side in a few top chases this season, Cool Dawn prevailed by nine lengths, earning a place on my Grand National shortlist although his trainer sees Harwell Lad as the more likely Aintree type.
Diminutive owner Dido Harding, under whom Cool Dawn had run a sulky race ear- lier this season, confessed in the unsaddling enclosure to distinctly mixed feelings. After such a showing, she confessed, she would have to keep Andy Thornton aboard for further big races and not claim the ride back for herself. She would have to be con- tent with a point to pointer they will have ready in February but still hopes for 'a ride or two this season'. There was much sym- pathy among the Harding coterie, along with shouts of 'Stand up, Dido!' (she was already doing so) at the prize giving. When you are a capable owner-rider you almost don't want your horse to be too good, so good that you simply have to hand him over to the professionals to demonstrate his full potential.
Ferdy Murphy's Paddy's Return went into my book as a live Cheltenham hope after an emphatic victory in the 3m plus Long Walk Hurdle. A former winner of the Triumph Hurdle and fifth in the French Champion hurdle, he left a class field trail- ing in his wake, including Pridwell and Bimsey. Since Murphy has French Holly too in his yard he could be in for a lovely Festival meeting. But Wahiba Sands's pre- tensions to Champion Hurdle status were exposed, to my mind, when he scrambled home from Solomon and Polydamas. And Henry Kelly advised me to tear up the 20-1 ante-post voucher I hold on I'm Supposin for the Champion after Richard Rowe's charge was beaten into third place by Mr Markham and Sharpical.
Following a chat with the trainer after- wards, I was less despondent. Pointing out that I'm Supposin is a big horse at 17.2 and still a colt, Richard Rowe declared, 'It'll take a few races to get him right. I would have to gallop him every day otherwise and you don't win any prizes for races at home. At the moment he's not quite seeing his races out. But he'll be right come March.' Jockey David Bridgewater reckoned that in a race with only a few runners his horse had been too fresh and keen, too eager to win his race at every hurdle. So I won't be turning my voucher into confetti just yet. And if Sharpical goes on to win the Lad- broke you might even see me smile.
Robin Oakley is political editor of the BBC.
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