Racing
Bloody genius
Jeffrey Bernard
If you ever take anyone racing for the first time and, presumably, intend for them to like the business, then I must advise you not to try them out with Kempton Park. This is an extremely dodgy and usually rather boring racetrack. Of course, it has its compensations. There are bars, bookmakers, races that are won by winners and the grass is green, but my experience of it last Bank' Holiday Monday has made me feel more than reluctant to visit the place again. The fact that the people who run the place will be remarkably undisturbed by that newt is simply more evidence that people care less and less about almost everything.
I arrived at the course with a brand new chaffeuse. Straight away I paid 40p to get into a car park. Reasonable enough. We then drove in a queue administered by National Car Park attendants for forty-five minutes until we reached another car park— not the one we paid to get into—where we were charged a further per head for the privilege of parking in the middle of the course which was where we didn't want to be in the first place. During this three-quarterhour drive in first gear we were frequently stopped by idiots employed by United Racecourses who mumbled utterly unnecessary orders like so many redundant sergeantmajors trying to get back into harness. Another Beau Geste type march got us to the grandstand and then to the Members' Transfer box. The racecourse authority couldn't have been bothered to leave me a Press Pass. I don't want to be treated like a king when I go racing, only like a lord, but when the sport is in the mess it's in and they tell you they're so keen to have nice words written about it, then you might think that they'd encourage you to attend the mad business.
The whole afternoon was so ghastly that not even the backing of Briar Patch, who won at 12-1, could entirely compensate for the solid hour of boredom plus the entrance money that it took to get into the Ring. Nerves were steadied and cooled by the sight of Briar Patch's trainer, Ryan Price. I'm told he gave a remarkable interview on television the other day at York in which he claimed to be a 'bloody genius'. I wish I'd seen.it. Captain Ryan Price is without doubt one of, if not the, most remarkable people in the business. I suppose what really upsets the few people that are upset by him is the bald fact that he really is a genius or pretty close to whatever that may be.
He trained the first winner of the afternoon as well, which steamed in at 15-1. There seems to be no stopping him at the moment. He seems to be pretty sure that Marquis de Sade will win the St Leger, but more of that next week.
Half way through the afternoon I fell in with a big punting owner from Wales, Paddy Gallacher, who was unlucky enough to have his horse Spade Guinea scratched from the big handicap of the day, the Ranmore Handicap. While all of us prayed for rain it appears they had a thunderstorm in Newmarket and in Bill Marshall's stable that horse got upset and hurt a leg. That moderately boring fact brought home yet again the business of luck in racing. On some previous form—out-of-date form—a case could-have been made out for Spade Guinea putting it in the race with as good a chance as Wollow, had he been in it with 10 stone.
Anyway, Paddy fancied it and I hate to think how much he would have put on it. Five years ago I bumped into him at .Sandown Park and he asked me to accompany him to the rails where he was going to collect from the bookmakers for a win he'd had the previous week with a hurdler at Cheltenham called Bumble Boy. I swear it took his man on the rails twenty, minutes to count the stuff out.
When I reminded him of the episode he quite rightly said, 'Don't forget the bad days.: Two days before all the car park shenanigans at Kempton plus the officiousness at that course it had been a different story at Windsor on Saturday when they held the last evening meeting of the year. They're odd things, evening meetings. The first race was at 5.30 pm and the last one around 8 pm. I'm not entirely sure I like them, although Windsor has its points. The executive seem to like racing, which is half the battle, but it feels slightly odd to start one's hooliganism at tea time. Royal Match won yet again and even if he is one of the best handicappers in training it must be an incredible tribute to
his trainer. Ryan Jarvis, that the horse goes on winning and winning.
That evening, I took as my companion for the betting, one Fred Dipper, a pub acquaintance from Lancashire who bets in fifties and hundreds and who doesn't know the difference between those employed by United Dairies and those sired by Sea Bird IL Over the years, I've bumped into a lot of characters like this one and they've all of them never failed to irritate me. Basically, they're men who gamble fairly heavily and with a modicum of success on a form of alaimated roulette that they don't understand. I'm beginning to twig the secret of their success. It's simply an utter contempt for money, regarding it simply as pieces of paper, and that in turn makes for supreme confidence. At Windsor that night, 1 tore a page from his book and found it rather nerve-racking. By the fifth race, I was so much down I was nearly drowning in selfpity and fiscal damage. Then I thought I'd put my betting boots on and wager like Fred. I had my last, but really last. £25 in the world on a one-paced horse called Sweet Reclaim and it just got up to win at 11-4 by half a length. I don't want to go through that again. I'll stick, in future, to being pretentiously knowledgeable, and the heart and pocket will last longer. Fred meanwhile will go on backing winners no doubt out of sheer blind ignorance and nerve. The Secretary-General did in fact make a substantial number of steps towards a solution to the problem which included: I. A condemnation of the hijacking in accordance with his usual practice immediately the news reached him on 28 June.
Sending two messages to President Amin, the second offering to help in any possible way and, further, meeting President Amin twice whilst in Mauritius to discuss negotiations with the hijackers.
3. Sending on 28 July instructions to his representative in Kampala, to assist in negotiations for the release of the hostages.
The distortions that were made in certain sections of the media at the time are still of importance since they serve to hide the main issue of terrorism and hijacking on which the Secretary-General has taken a firm stand. In September 1972 he placed the item on the agenda of the General Assembly, an unprecedented step, and since then has never hesitated to condemn hijackings whenever they have occurred.
Frank Field Director, United Nations Association, 93 Albert Embankment, London SE1
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