apology, muscat & no snail.

​Before writing this, I should, and I might, correct my mistake in yesterday’s blog, a mistake I repeated and no doubt repeated, though hopefully not again. I apologise to the connections, and to the horse, though he will not turn a hair as he is doubtless called something different by his handlers, for naming Crambo, Crampo. A man with little brain and even less memory really should not go public with his thoughts without the aid and safety-net of an editor.

Infuriated once again by journalists praising owners of potentially great horses who cowardly act in support of their bank balance rather than for the good of the sport. In his appraisal of the best 25 flat horses of the last 25-years, Julian Muscat said this of Sea The Stars, rated second in his list, begrudgingly, I got the feeling, behind the only horse who could have come top, Frankel – ‘set the standard by which any other horse aspiring to greatness must attain’.
Julian Muscat’s standard for applying ‘greatness’ to a horse must be far lower than the standard I apply. But first, Sea The Stars achieved a string of Group 1 wins that few in the entire history of the sport will ever achieve. But as John Randall would say, quantity is not the same as quality’. For 7-months, Sea The Stars was, undoubtedly, the best flat horse on the planet. In comparison, Frankel was the best flat horse on the planet for 24-months. For all he was a star both on the racecourse and by name, Sea The Stars was a hither-he-goes shooting star, while Frankel was as reliable as the planet Venus.
If journalists continue to apply greatness to horses retired to stud after only one completed season on the racecourse, a shooting star of 7-months, for example, they praise cowardice on behalf of connections, of personal wealth over what is good for the sport. We all know the ceiling reached by Frankel, though I personally longed to see him run over 12-furlongs, as he was campaigned without fear of exposing any weakness he might have. We will never know the ceiling Sea The Stars might have reached as his connections in exporting him off to stud, never rolled the dice and asked him to put his reputation on the line by attempting to give weight to the following season’s 3-year-old classic and Group 1 winners.

A while back, I wrote my thoughts – I do not review books – on David Owen’s ‘No Snail’, his book on the life of L’Escargot. Recently the author got in touch with me to explain the difficulties he was confronted with in writing the book. People who should have had a lot to say about the horse choose not to cooperate and other holes in the road that made his life more difficult than it should have been.
He was polite with his explanation when he could have been critical of me. As I replied, and as I doubtless wrote at the time – and, yes, I should re-read my thoughts after first reading the book but, as well as needing an editor, I need a secretary to make sense of my lazy and inexpert filing system. Yes, I cannot find my copy as I cannot remember how it was titled and there are over 1,400 documents in my document file – I was dizzy with expectation of the book. Firstly, I enjoyed, and recommend, David Owen’s book on Foinavon, and, secondly, I believe history is not being kindly written to L’Escargot as he is part of a small club of horses having won two Cheltenham Gold Cups and a Grand National, achieving the high honour of beating Red Rum in his own backyard in the race that will forever be thought-of as owned by the McCain’s greatest of horses.
And, I believe, it was the pricking of my aspirations for the book that might have resulted in being critical of ‘No Snail’. I might also have been down in the dumps at the time – I often am. So, I am giving the book a second chance. I have reached the point where L’Escargot is becoming a steeplechaser rather than a hurdler.
If you have not read ‘No Snail’, go find a copy and if you must, connect with this site to give me your appraisal of it. And if you have not yet read ‘Foinavon’, read it after you have read ‘No Snail’, as I think I would have been far less damning if I did not have the Foinavon book to compare it with.