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jennywales

FESTIVAL 2009 – BACK TO THE FUTURE (OR HOW WE FOUGHT THE RECESSION AND WON, EVENTUALLY….)

DAY 1 – THE BEGINNING

It was, I suppose, appropriate that there were dark clouds over Cleeve Hill, softened by the occasional burst of March sunlight and the even more occasional rain shower. This probably reflected, if one were prone to extravagances of metaphor, the mood of the crowd, the mood of Cheltenham management, and indeed possibly also the mood of racing itself.

However, I will save the philosophy (and the politics!) for further and better consideration. Today is a day to concentrate on the racing, to welcome the Festival and to stick a few quid on something silly because it’s supposed to be a festival, therefore festive, and it seems the right thing to do – to chuck money away in defiance of the gods of filthy lucre, who have decreed that for the meantime we shall all have fewer pennies in our pockets in one way or another, and be pretty sparing with those we do have, except for those who have presided over the ruination of our banks and building societies (building? Where did that concept go astray, I wonder?)

This year for the first time, I went in the Best Mate enclosure. OK, it isn’t as carpeted as Tatts, or as (relatively) hushed and champagned as the Club. You don’t get access to the winner’s enclosure or the parade ring, or the saddling boxes, but for me that isn’t really a penalty, because I am so short I can’t see anything when I go there on Festival days anyway. Best Mate is, by comparison, basic – but it is a friendly and effective basic; there is carpet (but not obviously!), there are loads of bookies, and plenty of Tote windows, there is food and drink, relatively expensive but on the whole acceptable, and best of all the viewing from the stand steps is better than in either Tatts or Club, particularly for the shorter people. The course is laid out before you much more sweepingly than in other locations, there is a big screen, and almost all of the course is eminently visible (particularly the Cross Country) from those stands. The clientele is Hackney rather than Home Counties but then who cares who you stand next to at race meetings, as long as they are not obnoxious, aggressive, or so drunk they fall over on you. The only disadvantage, as far as the more stricken in years (including me) is concerned, is that there are very few seats of any sort. You therefore have to be prepared for (a) wearing your most extremely comfortable shoes regardless of style, and (b) finding any convenient location to perch a while.

The other thing to note is that if you have never had, or taken, the opportunity to walk up the Cheltenham hill (and everyone who does have that opportunity should take it, because it is the only way to get a true appreciation of exactly how daunting that hill is), then the view of it from the Best Mate stands is the best you’ll get. Looked at from side on and above (as in Tatts and Club) it doesn’t seem very much – looked at from not quite head on but nearly it becomes a very different proposition.

There is another effect which the positioning of the Best Mate enclosure creates, and that is acoustic. Because it is slightly above the level of the course itself and the stands on the other side of the course, the crowd noise (usually cheering) is oddly hollow/resonant – the traditional cheer that greets the start of the Supreme Novices sounded subdued; by contrast, the cheer that greeted McCoy’s win on Wichita Lineman, and Ruby’s on Quevega, practically lifted the rafters. Different sort of cheer, perhaps?

There were several “non-cheering” races, however. The Supreme Novices kicked off the meeting superbly for Noel Meade and Paul Carberry (Go Native) and for the bookies, but not for the punters, who had put their faith in Cousin Vinny only to be disappointed. I have to say that turning for home he never looked like he was going to be in it, and so it proved. Maybe Mullins’s warning about not being himself was a fair one. Medermit second and Hen Knight’s Somersby third at 40/1 (I hope she had a few quid on for the place, but I suspect not!)

The Arkle has all along been a puzzle, which proved just as much of a puzzle on the day as it did beforehand. Forpadytheplasterer (owned by the delightfully named Goat Racing Syndicate) did what he had been threatening to do for a while – win it! Kalahari King was second. Calgary Bay never seemed able to challenge effectively, Tatenen fell over early on, and compounded his error by jumping (and breaking) the running rails and looking as though he was going to jump into the Best Mate enclosure as well. Luckily he did not, and eventually returned unscathed after what appeared to be an excursion to the pub just outside the car park.

There are only two things to say about the Will Hill – Tony McCoy and Wichita Lineman, probably in that order. It’s a racing cliché to say that a jockey lifted his horse over the line - but in this case, you could see what it really means. McCoy got the biggest cheer yet for a riding performance that will probably be picked as ride of the Festival, never mind ride of the day. Majlimar was a worthy second, and my two were about 6th (Lacdoudal) and nowhere (Patsy Hall, who disappeared out the back early on like a ferret down a drainpipe and was apparently the subject of a Paul Daniels magic trick – never mind rabbits out of hats, this rabbit vanished into one…..slightly unfair that – but I liked the phrase! – according to RP did OK in the second part of the race and fell two out, although I was hard put to find him on the second circuit – I don’t suppose the RP race summary is given to being over-kindly about performances…...)

So on we went, to the Champion Hurdle. Now two things are often said about this race – they go off at an absolutely hair-raising pace, and the winner is the one who battles it out up the hill. The first was manifestly not true. You get an excellent sideways look at the field from the Best Mate after they have passed the stands for the first time, and I can positively assert that they were not motoring – indeed the pace could reasonably have been described as sedate. This may have been due to the going, which was “good/soft, soft places” and probably a bit softer than that. The end result was that you got a true run race, to be frank, rather than the mad scramble the early stages of the Champion Hurdle can be. However, the effect was that the last three furlongs (and indeed the pull up the hill) may have had a disproportionate effect on the result. Binocular loomed up, as he was expected to do, alongside Celestial Halo (also expected to be there or thereabouts). But hey, what are these grey colours (rather subdued and elegant)? They shouldn’t be there, it’s Punjabi and he IS staying on up the hill (as were all three who were in contention) and oh look, Binocular is trying and trying, and McCoy on board him is trying and trying, but he ain’t going to get there. Punjabi did, at 22/1, and his reception was perhaps best described as polite rather than ecstatic, although it is a pity in these circumstances that money rather than admiration talks. He had, after all, beaten four previous winners (Hardy Eustace, Brave Inca, Sublimity and Katchit, who finished an honourable 6th), the hot favourite and the second favourite, which is no mean achievement

Everyone took a deep breath and moved on to the Cross Country. Now this was supposed to be an Enda Bolger/J P McManus carve up, and so it proved, with the field tackling the variety of fences with enthusiasm and accuracy (those that pulled up or fell acquitted themselves honourably before they did so). I had backed Drombeag on the basis of his Foxhunter and Irish form, against the shorter priced Garde Champetre and L’Ami, who everybody was convinced was the horse whose “turn” it was to win! Not so, Nina Carberry did the biz in the style to which we are delighted to become accustomed. A bigger smile you will not see, even when the Gold Cup is won. At last I got a return for places on Drombeag and A New Story (4th) but a friend managed the trifecta which I admired because I didn’t have the guts to do it myself!

On to the last, the Mares Hurdle. Quevega, well-backed, made up to Ruby Walsh for his ignominious exit in the Arkle and to the punters by starting favourite after a day of considerably mixed fortunes, and a great cheer went up, accompanied by appropriately torn-up betting slips. Carole’s Legacy finished well back in the field, but with the weight of my money on her that was not surprising. In fact, the RP results opined that she wasn’t quite right, because she certainly didn’t run to expectations, even modest ones.

The first day quite often sets the tone for the rest of the meeting – so maybe mixed fortunes can be expected over the next few days (and the layers, having sorted out Cousin Vinny and Binocular will be gunning for Kasbah Bliss and Voy por Ustedes…..)

DAY 2 – THE FIRST MIDDLE BIT

Day 2 is always a bit odd. There is one super race, the Queen Mum, one for the amateurs, the National Hunt chase, two for the gamblers (the Coral Cup and the bumper) and two for the purists (the RSA Chase and the Ballymore). The poor old Fred Winter tends to take a back seat, relatively speaking.

In the NH Chase, Will Biddick did what every amateur both dreams of and dreads – he set off in front, got the horse jumping after a couple of dodgy ones early on, held the lead for at least half the way, was prominent going down the hill, but could not sustain the effort over the last 3 furlongs. A pity, and Pangbourne will win something fairly significant (perhaps at Aintree) in not too long a time. Tricky Trickster, trained by Twiston-Davies (oh how appropriate that name might be…..) won under a very good ride from Sam Waley-Cohen. Rose Dobbin on Nine de Sivola got a place – good girl! Nina Carberry’s ride (Parson’s Pistol) was prominent in the early stages but did the shot rabbit routine and disappeared from sight pretty quickly. Fell three out, as I understand it, but having been in contention the first and half of the second time around the park quite quickly dropped out of it again.

The Ballymore Novices is always reckoned a decent augury of potential. Mikael d’Haguenet has it in abundance, and doshed Ruby Walsh another win on a favourite. Mad Max showed nothing, while the placed horses (Karabak and Diamond Harry) ran well enough – although Diamond Harry needs to smarten up his jumping. I thought, too, that the pace set was not altogether lively, and a sudden dash up the hill after an idling Part I is never really very satisfactory, although this may have been down to the going, which looked (and indeed felt) as though it was sticky, tacky and “dead” all at once. At least the watering policy can’t be blamed, since there hasn’t been one.

Ruby must be in storming form, because he won the RSA Chase on Cooldine, with ease and looking round. Horner Woods came second and Massini’s Maguire third (I would like to have had a place only bet on Horner Woods, who was returned at 66/1). However, true to form, my pick, Ballyfitz, was pulled up. So on to the main event, the Queen Mum.

It was interesting that there was a noticeable increase in security for the parade for this race (as there had been for the Champion Hurdle, but it was less conspicuous because I did not go down to the rails on that occasion). A chat to a communicative security man revealed that yes, there was more security (both visible and not so visible) and yes, the threat level had been increased – possibly because of the recent events in Ireland but also possibly because of intelligence on animal rights activists. It is a pity that Cheltenham feels it has to provide such a high level of security – the Grand National has done this routinely over recent years, because they know the race is a target, but not Cheltenham; so I hope it was a response to a specific perceived threat and not something that will become automatic.

The race was in truth something of a let-down. Master Minded never looked like losing, but there was very little bite or edge to the contest; I would have preferred it if he had either walked (galloped?) all over them majestically, or had a battle of epic proportions which he won. There was something far too subdued about all the performances for the race to count, this year, as one of racing’s glittering moments. I do have to say, however, that if there were an award for training performance of the Festival, it would go to David Pipe for bringing Well Chief back after injury, lay-offs and God knows what, to take an extremely brave second place to one of the best two mile chasers of this generation.

Marodima almost caused havoc by practically carting poor Nick Schofield twice, breaking the tape both times. So two false starts was perhaps not the best send off for the (usually) most quickly-run chase of the meeting. My congratulations go to Nick (for not giving up in the face of hysterical over-excitement on the horse’s part and bearing up under the most public of humiliations) and to the starter’s assistant, who gallantly hung on to Marodima’s reins as if he were a large salmon being played on a lightweight rod, in order to get a decent start third time lucky; and who then for his pains got damn near trampled on! Horses can very occasionally be unforgiving beasts…..

Now, the Coral Cup is an absolute minefield in the betting sense, and anyone who tries to tell you different is ignorant or having a giraffe; so when I say that the 1st to 4ths odds were 14/1, 14/1, 9/1 and 40/1 respectively you will understand what I mean! Over half the field were running from out of the handicap and Lough Derg was asked to carry a top-of-the-handicap 11st12, thus giving 8lbs to the next “best” (Franchoek). In such a minefield, the ante-post “good thing” (The Polomoche) wasn’t, and after he dropped out fairly early on, and Lough Derg chucked it in, probably because he was not allowed an easy lead, the whole thing developed into something of a free-for-all – at least no-one fell over. The spoils went to Ninetieth Minute (nice to see a Taaffe training a winner at Cheltenham!), with Mirage Dore (nice place again, Rose!), Pause and Clause and Star of Angels following him home. Clearly the Irish money was down.

The Fred Winter, nearly overlooked, bless it, was won by Silk Affair (I didn’t realise that Tom O’Brien is Aidan O’Brien’s cousin) and Ski Sunday came a worthy second, for which I was glad because he is owned by a syndicate of players from the Llanelli Scarlets and I had backed him e/w.

And it was down in the next, too, but even Mullins with his eight entries couldn’t grab the prize this time – Dunguib, clearly very well backed, made it a bit of a procession, to be honest; and neither Mullins’s good things nor the Dermot Weld trained Rite of Passage could trouble Dunguib, who on the day Dun pretty Guid!

Here endeth the second day, and I have made a rule for anyone going in the Best Mate – it’s fine in most ways, but don’t go in too early (if you can manage that) because by 4.30 or so you will be screaming for a decent sit-down!

DAY 3 – THE SECOND MIDDLE BIT

I stayed at home (well, at the B and B!) Had a kipper for breakfast. Popped into Ledbury for the shopping. Back by 1230 (having taken in the Morning Line) with a glass of wine and something to eat, the log fire lit, telly on and all snug.

But I’ll tell you, I won’t remember the day and the races nearly as well by watching them on the comfortable sofa in the warm, where I could have been out in the March air, struggling with burgers, doughnuts, crowds and the fact that bar staff will insist on adding all the ginger ale to the whisky instead of giving you them separately…..

In other words, racing in the living room is fine, but there is no sense of immediacy, no effort is involved (on the watcher’s part) and very little satisfaction therefore accrues. I had a nice day, and it was probably wise to miss out one day because four racing days on the trot would test the stamina – but for the real experience, the close up, the excitement, the interest and the battles, GO RACING!!

Kasbah Bliss got stuffed. With luck, Big Buck’s will be really good over fences. I backed a 33/1 winner (Something Wells). Robert Thornton recovered from an appalling fall from Big Zeb. Nina Carberry’s helmet was cracked. Paul Carberry had to go to hospital (we wish him well). There was some sort of fashion guru and a nice interview with Phillip Hobbs. But it simply wasn’t the same…….

DAY 4 – THE END OF IT BIT

I have one piece of advice for those attending next year – DON’T go in Tatts. Tatts is, to put it frankly, tatty. It is much smaller in terms of viewing space than you would imagine when you look across to the whole of the stands complex – it is in fact only about one fifth of that huge main building. The result is that people are crammed in like sardines, therefore you cannot watch the races “live” unless you bag a place on the rails and keep it. The clientele is heavily laden with stag dos, groups of drunken lads (or drunken groups of lads) and hard-faced girls in inappropriate dresses and shoes. And I really see no major advantage in being able to lose money with a very wide range of bookmakers, when the Tote does the same job just as effectively….OK Ms Ellen Martin is personable enough, but I don’t see that as a reason why I should subject myself to discomfort, harassment and inappropriate chanting for almost four hours on a Friday afternoon.

Either splash out for Club (but don’t forget the awful but inevitable corporates – although I guess there were fewer of them this year), or do the decent thing and get a view and a pie (none of this poncy smoked salmon!) in the Best Mate, which for the price I cannot recommend highly enough.

And I have just one question (well, make that two as its Gold Cup day). First, why do people (mainly but not exclusively men) come to one of the best and most important days of the racing year and then proceed to get absolutely hammered. I simply don’t understand the logic. You can get hammered much more cheaply at home or down the local, so why do it at Cheltenham? Second, why do total strangers insist on telling you they had £5000 on Kauto Star after the race is over (maybe I look too Auntyish and people like to confide their dreadful secrets to me....)?

So, to the racing….

The Triumph Hurdle was a good race, paced well. Zaynar won it, from Walkon. Ebadiyan (who I thought had a very decent chance) appeared to run out at the second last – at least, the horse left the course and there was no enquiry, so presumably he wasn’t pushed off his line. The County Hurdle was won by Ruby (again) on American Trilogy.

I missed the Albert Bartlett, (a) because I couldn’t decide what if anything to back, and (b) because I wanted to spend some time at the pre-parade ring looking at the Gold Cup horses. The “frightfully elegant hats with feathers and country tweeds” brigade were congregated around said pre-parade ring, also graced by the presence of Clive Smith, Claire Balding, Mick Fitzgerald and Alice Plunkett. Harry Findlay appeared in a startling purple full length overcoat, thus almost literally nailing his colours to the mast. Paul Barber looked like a Welsh shepherd about to enter a sheep-dog trial with Kim and Dai. Paul Nicholls was wearing a particularly vile-coloured tweed suit…..

My impressions of the horses were thus; Kauto Star looked extremely fit, walked out well, swung his quarters as a Star (in both senses) should and generally looked ready to run for his life. Denman seemed to me to be not quite at the peak of fitness – they had left some hair around his ears (maybe he hates having his ears interfered with?!), and he still had that slightly odd dappling that was noticed when he was at Kempton, particularly round the hindquarters. But he didn’t look nearly as tucked up as he did on that occasion. He wasn’t walking particularly well, however, and looked a touch stiff behind. If I were awarding marks for fitness and conformation, then Madison du Berlais would have been given a decent 8/10, but he was still light framed, and I think we tend to forget, particularly with lots of Flat and French-breds continually before our eyes, what the real type of a robust chaser used to be and indeed possibly should still be.

Once the race got into gear, Kauto Star looked nowhere near any sort of a beating, and he regained his championship by eleven lengths. I was pleased to see Denman take second – given the circumstances surrounding his run, I was a bit afraid that he would not enter the fray at all, or make some bad mistake and/or be pulled up. Neither of those things happened, thank God. At least that run (beating Exotic Dancer) will have convinced that almost everything, if not everything, is now “all right” with Denman. It wasn’t in the end a hard race, but it was a searching one, and Denman stuck to his task well.

It is now clear that (a) Denman, if they continue to take care of him, is well on the comeback trail and (b) Kauto Star is a real star in every sense and we are privileged to see him in his prime. What a race! What a winner! And what a runner-up!

So on to the Foxhunters, the amateurs Gold Cup and my favourite race of the meeting (no, really!) I had spread myself a bit betting wise, with my main money going on Robbers Glen at prices from 70s to 33s. I also had an on course bet e/w on Baby Run, whose credentials coming into the race were promising.

However, the race panned out extremely favourably for Cappa Bleu, who justified his ante post support (at one time being made favourite, although Juveigneur was sent off at the head of the market – and unfortunately, because he looked A1 in the paddock, could only manage 12th). The race itself was interesting, with most of them jumping well and the lead changing hands several times. Val Jackson kept Robbers Glen to the outside, presumably deliberately so as to give him a good look at the Cheltenham fences (I went against one of my own “rules” when backing him because he had no course form). However, Cappa Bleu, a talented pointer recently recruited from Ireland where he won his first two points, and then continued his progress over here by qualifying with two Open wins, in the end had the beating of the rest, including Turthen who put up an excellent showing for 2nd. Richard Burton, a first class amateur, took the ride, although there was some speculation in the run-up to the race that Cappa Bleu might get balloted out because he had no form under Rules from which the handicapper could take a notional mark, those horses with such marks being protected under the balloting out rules.

Robbers Glen came 5th, which was in truth a sterling effort from a horse and rider who had never tackled Cheltenham before, and Val Jackson’s grin at the end when coming back down the horsewalk said it all. Of the rest, Amicelli, last years’ winner, came a decent 4th. Kingscliff turned it in halfway round, Juveigneur was run out of it relatively early, and Christy Beamish confirmed his dislike of Cheltenham by tailing off and being pulled up.

Cappa Bleu is clearly something of a find, and Sheila Crow may well run him at Stratford for the Horse and Hound Cup – no mention of Aintree, which I think is probably sensible. He will then go to Evan Williams to be trained for Rules, possibly looking at the Hennessy. There are little Gold Cup gleams in the owners’ eye too, and who would blame them……Let’s not forget that Best Mate came out of Irish pointing.

Nicky Henderson (a bit ironically!) won the first running of the Martin Pipe Conditionals’ Hurdle, with Andytown, with David Pipe saddling eight in the hopes of winning it for his Dad – no such luck, though! Big Eared Fran was heavily backed in the ring, but 25/1 was a very decent price for those who did back Andytown (I know at least one person who did!)

And the very end, the Grand Annual (made the last race in a slight change of programming), was won by Alan King (first Festival winner this year for him!) with Oh Crick.

Then everyone packed up and went home, apart from me, who found I had a flat tyre when I finally got back to the car park, and had to wait for the RAC to come and rescue me – a task made less simple because there were of course some 70,000 people and the equivalent 1,000s of cars all trying to leave at once, while one solitary RAC van was trying to arrive. Oh well, it was Friday 13th, so I suppose I should have been expecting it…..

If I reflect on the Festival as a whole, I would say five things, three general and two personal. The general ones are (a) that the atmosphere was a touch more subdued than in other years, maybe because of the recession; (b) that although I think one horse (Clarified) had to be put down, this was the only fatality, which over four days of extraordinarily competitive racing is an extremely good result; and (c) that given the amount of opprobrium heaped on his head during the run-up to the Festival, Simon Claisse this time seemed to get the whole thing, including watering/not watering, just right.

Personally, I will (a) never go in Tatts again (Best Mate or Club depending on available pennies) and (b) take more advantage of the bookies offering 4/5 places when they go NRNB and cut down even further on a/p bets (which were fair play down this year by 75% for me in terms of value).

Lastly, I hope everyone is recovering/has recovered from the drama and excitement of it all. Now it’s Aintree, Punchestown and the Flat….and so the years roll inexorably along (and no, that isn’t a tip!)

Good luck, all!

© JennyWales 2009