​Reading the Racing Post this week it seems the general overview of its journalists is that ‘Champions Day’ is a success, with no tinkering with the format required. From a marketing perspective I would imagine it is a success and 30,000 spectators make a good argument for the defence. And I am quite certain the concept has potential, even if I cannot understand why the major Group 1’s need to be bracketed together to form a league table.
What pulls my chain the most, though, about Champions Day is the title. The title ‘Champions Day’ promises a day of champions, and as the central spectacle of the day is horse racing the title suggests an array of equine champions, of which this year there were few, though by its conclusion Cracksman had perhaps saved the day. But equine champions are not what Champions Day is about, even if the racing can be, weather permitting, out of the top drawer. If only Ascot could have promised the spectators Enable and Winx, true champions, the title would not be subject to the trades descriptions act and the racecourse would have resembled an Indian commuter train.
Of course the day is truly Qipco Champions Day, with the day spawning five Qipco champions and the sponsorship of Qipco should not be undervalued. But who remembers the names of the Qipco Champions twelve months later or indeed one week later? So why not title the day Qipco Day. They throw enough money at the event; why not umbrella the whole day under their branding.
In my previous piece on this subject I suggested, radically, moving ‘Qipco Day’ to the start of the season, mainly as an incentive for owner/breeders to keep their good horses in training beyond their 3-year-old careers. This may seem a barnpot idea. But think on. Already Group horses are sent to Dubai for the Dubai Carnival, which allows for the two events – ‘Qipco Day’ and the Dubai Carnival – to work hand-in-hand. Also, the general criticism of the flat is that it begins not with a bang but a whimper and this idea will knock the whimper into the North Sea, if not the Norwegian fjords.
If by some unlikely event my idea is implemented the turf flat season could begin as tradition dictates with the Lincoln, with perhaps trials for the races chosen for ‘Qipco Day’ added, with the big day two weeks later, allowing the Group I horses time to relax and recuperate before the big summer meetings come around.
Give it some thought: the glory and high sporting profile of the Cheltenham Festival, the Grand National and then ‘Qipco Day’. Three meetings that will keep the sporting eye on horse racing over a period six, seven or eight weeks.
Now, the contentious issue of the ground. At Ascot in October the odds are that the ground will be soft, though the same can be said for April. But that is not necessarily so. Both Cheltenham and Aintree invariably have to water to retain safe ground and the shift in our weather patterns suggest firmer ground for spring than for autumn will become the norm. But in this country who can be sure. A ‘Qipco Day’ in April could be lost to either frost or snow. In that eventuality it could be rescheduled, whereas at present in October if the meeting is lost to waterlogging I doubt if it would be practical to reschedule.
Of course the big stumbling block to a blockbuster start to the British Turf Season with ‘Qipco Day’ is the European Pattern Committee, though as there are few Group 1’s in Europe in April I think they may find the proposal acceptable, if not downright attractive. If I had my way, which is highly unlikely, there would be six Group 1 races, not five, with a Group 1 established either over 7-furlongs or 1-mile and a half. I would suggest a Group 1 for 3-year-olds but I suspect that is not viable with all the Guineas races only a few weeks away.
I would return the Champion Stakes to Newmarket, its spiritual home and put in its place on ‘Qipco Day’ a new 1-mile 2-furlongs race, with consideration given to naming it after Frankel. The Frankel Stakes has a ring to it. And I would return the Royal Lodge to Ascot. But that is a discussion for another day.
If we were to launch the new flat season every year with a 40-runner Lincoln Handicap started from a barrier as in the days of yore, allowing the flat a race that is as different from the norm as the Grand National is to every other jump race, followed two weeks later by a ‘Qipco Day’ with 6 Group 1’s, the spring sporting programme would belong to horse racing. 

​Sir Gordon Richards had 21,834 rides in his career, winning 4,870 races. He won the 2,000 Guineas 3 times, the 1,000 Guineas 3 times, the Oaks twice, the St.Leger 5 times and famously the Derby once. He was champion jockey 26 times, a feat no one is ever likely to equal. He considered Pinza the best horse he ever rode.
Trainers flocked to him and at one point in his career he had 5 retainers all at the same time. His character was as straight as a die and his word was his bond. His career straddled the careers of Steve Donoghue and Lester Piggott. At the start of the 2nd World War he wanted to enlist but he had been struck down with T.B. as a young man and the scars prevented him from active duty. Determined to do his duty for King and Country he bought a farm to help in feeding the population, made public appearances to raise morale, joined the Home Guard, and, though race meetings were zoned and limited, he continued to ride.
I just can’t imagine in similar circumstances Lester either wanting to enlist or buying a farm to grow potatoes.
Incidentally Sir Gordon was very supportive of young Lester, advising him and reminding people when trouble seemed to stalk his every move that he was a mere child in a man’s world, and in his autobiography he makes a point of reminding his readers that a lot of trash was written about Lester. He said that it was to Lester’s credit that despite everything written about him, both praiseworthy and critical, he remained ‘so natural, and in no way conceited’. He also made it plain that Lester was never cheeky in the weighing room, never referred to him as ‘Grandad’ and in Sir Gordon’s hearing was never rude to anyone. He liked Lester and wanted him to succeed.
He wrote that one day at Worcester – they had flat racing there in Sir Gordon’s day – when Lester was only thirteen or fourteen, he was riding a big horse in a 2-mile race. Going down the back stretch he thought Lester was going to fall off through exhaustion and passing him Sir Gordon offered the advice to ‘sit still and let the horse run round himself’ and Lester did as he was told and he was ‘alright’.
Interestingly, on the day at Ascot when Lester got one of his lengthy suspensions, Sir Gordon, Poincelet, Doug Smith and Rickaby all spoke up for him in the stewards enquiry, asking them to be lenient. Mind you, Sir Gordon expressed the view that it would be a sad day for racing if the public were allowed to view steward enquiries.
I am not sure if it is widely known but when Sir Gordon began training he was negotiating with Lester for him to take up the position as stable jockey but Noel Murless also wanted him, offering him the opportunity to take over from Sir Gordon as his stable jockey.
One of the many retainers he had was with the former Aga Khan and at the end of each season he would write to him to express his opinions on the prospects for the following season. Having so many top trainers and owners wishing to employ him no doubt allowed Sir Gordon to always be honest in his opinion and he told the Aga Khan that though he was breeding beautiful horses bred in the purple more and more they were lacking resolution at the business end of a race. The Aga Khan took his advice and brought in American bloodlines and culled a major portion of his broodmares. So the present Aga Khan has Sir Gordon to thank for his continuing success.
The surprising aspect of Sir Gordon’s story is that at the height of his career he suffered from what he called ‘nerves’ or depression as we would term the condition today. And not just for short periods but in prolonged spells, even taking to his bed and refusing to get up for days. Keeping it secret for the whole of his career is testament perhaps to the shame associated in those days with the condition and the integrity and loyalty of his friends and family.
And the secret of his success as a jockey, in his own words – ‘Briefly, I have never ceased to be on the job’. I think he meant he was 100% dedicated to his craft.
Sir Gordon was proud of his achievements, especially of beating Fred Archer’s record for the most wins in a season. Never boastful, mind you, but proud in the right sense of the word. Yet being the sort of man he was, if he were still alive in 2002 when A.P.McCoy rode 289 winners to take away his record, he would have been one of the first people to congratulate him. And A.P. would have been as proud of that handshake as he was of breaking the record.
And A.P. never did break his career record total, and I doubt if anyone will come close to 4870 winners.

​Unusually I had company for the racing on Saturday. Uninformed company, I admit, though the lack of specialist knowledge might make the following observation of more interest to those who believe ‘Champions Day’ to be a rip-roaring success story. Acclaimed as the flat season’s end of season highlight, the last day of the championship, if not the turf, season, with Ed Chamberlain wishing a fond farewell to Francesca and Jason, - it is Hayley I will miss the most - it made my reply to the question ‘I take it from next Saturday it will only be jump racing on television’ far more difficult to answer than if what was being discussed was the last day of the Premier League or the cricket season as next Saturday I.T.V. will be covering one jumps meeting and two flat meetings, with one more Group 1 for Aidan )’Brien to win still to come.
So much for making the flat season’s narrative easy for the non-racing public to understand.
Not that Silvestre de Sousa is not both a deserving and inspirational champion jockey. But that does not change my opinion one iota that the present way of determining the champion jockey is as bonkers as a pork pie lolly-pop. It is marketing straight out of the Bernie Ecclestone ‘How to make a formerly exciting sport as dull as the M4.”
My big gripe about ‘Champions Day’, though, even though the racing was of a level above the ordinary fare for a Saturday, was that no real ‘Champion’ was crowned. It was, supposedly, Britain’s big horse racing highlight, yet the connections of Ulysses considered the Arc and the Breeders Cup more inviting opportunities, with no takers from the U.S. or Australia, as happens with Royal Ascot. The problem with the ‘Champions’ concept is two-fold. Firstly there is no convenient place in the season for it to sit, with only October, when the ground will doubtless be testing and when the meeting faces stiff competition from both the Arc and the Breeders Cup, available. And secondly the notion that bracketing all the big group races together will entice connections to run their best horses more frequently is completely flawed as the big Group 1’s will always attract the same horses as before the Qipco branding.
I admit that the weather cannot be predicted, and the next five instalments of ‘Champions Day’ may take place under a blue sky and on top of the ground. But this is England in October and as often as not the ground at this time of year for a flat meeting at Ascot will be described with the word soft as its main constituent. The horses that went on the ground on Saturday provided either an awesome performance or exciting finishes but the finishing distances resembled heavy ground at the end of a 4-miler at Cheltenham.
Cracksman (Mr.Oppenheimer gives his horses brilliant names. Other owners take note.) was as impressive a winner as I have witnessed all season yet though he won the Champion Stakes no crown could be placed on his head. He was the closest we came to a Champion racehorse on Saturday, though he did not win any one of the five divisional championships up for grabs. Not that I.T.V. thought it important enough to display the final placings in the divisions. Which it wasn’t as no one in two or three years’ time will be able to remember the five horses that topped the Qipco championship league tables.
Also, if you must have a non-championship race on ‘Champions Day, why not have mile handicap qualifiers throughout the season with the final as the final event instead of the Balmoral H’cap, a worthy enough race but very much a spectacle on the lines of ‘after the Lord’s Mayor Show’ about it. In fact whether they keep faith with the Balmoral or take up my idea wouldn’t it better for this race to be the first race on the card, allowing the Champion Stakes to bring the curtain down?
As someone who believes the best marketing strategy the flat could implement is to give every possible incentive to owners to keep their top horses in training for as long as possible I offer this radical idea: schedule ‘Champions Day’ at the other end of the season, as a glamorous appetizer to the season to come, when there is no competition from horses races around the world. This idea would marry the previous season to the present and replace the traditional drab start with glitter and stardust about it. Perhaps the Saturday after the Grand National, with 2,000 and 1,000 Guineas trials instead of the Balmoral, or as well as. Perhaps £4-million in prize money would not be enough of an incentive to keep the previous season’s top milers, sprinters, stayers and middle distances horses in training. If it were to be doubled perhaps top horses from around the world might join the party.
The concept of a ‘Champions Day’ should be kept. Even arch misery-guts like me see the merit in it. It just doesn’t do at the moment what is said on the can. And that should addressed, not swept under the marketing carpet.

​I am presently reading Sir Gordon Richards autobiography ‘My Story’. Like similar books on horse racing it is now – the book was published in 1955 – very much a history book, with much that can be learned. What is very clear from the outset of the book is that alongside British Society horse racing has changed, perhaps less radically than society in general but the alterations are easily marked in the tone of Richards’ account of his career and within the racing scene he describes.
Sir Gordon was born into what we would categorise these days as poverty. He was one of eight children. His father a miner. Although intelligent Gordon had only a limited education, his family were strict Primitive Methodists and he was sent out to work for his living as soon as he was able. It was his mother he had to thank for his career as she was astute with money and saved earnestly so the family could own their own home, even buying other properties to rent out. She also built a range of stables so that Gordon and his siblings could have a pony. Gordon used the pony to earn extra money ferrying passengers to and from the local railway station by pony and trap. He was barely thirteen when he started the enterprise.
At the beginning of his career there were no horseboxes and horses had to be led to the nearest railway station for transportation to the races. Sir Gordon relates walking a horse 5-miles to Shrivenham Station, with the same 5-mile walk back to the stables after what might have been a journey to Ayr or Yarmouth. These days, of course, after a long journey by road horses are taken straight to their stables. Athletes, footballers, tennis players etc, have long warm-down sessions after competing and the thought struck me that perhaps the walk from the railway station to the stables was in effect what we would term a warm-down session and benefitted the musculature of the horse, allowing it to recover more quickly from its exertions.
Sir Gordon was small, something like 4ft 11 and weighed under eight stone. In his book he balances his success against the man whose record total of winners in a season he broke, Fred Archer, and although he felt that he was at a disadvantage having to carry so much lead in his saddle overall he thought Archer’s achievement was greater because of the physical disadvantages he had to overcome and the greater difficulty in getting to racecourses. He wrote early in the book that his story was that of a successful life ‘and so I suppose I shall not be able to escape giving, here and there, the impression of conceit’, he comes across quite modest in his achievements. He might have titled his book ‘Modesty To False For Words’, as his modest overtone is balanced by pride in all he achieved.
Sir Gordon rode for the majority of his career – certainly the most successful years of his career – as stable jockey for the man he termed ‘the master of Beckhampton, Fred Darling. There is, of course, a 1,000 Guineas trial at Newbury named after Darling, and given his successes perhaps deserved, though he does not come across, even though Sir Gordon is more praiseful than critical, as someone I personally would not get on with. Even Sir Gordon said of him: ‘Mr. Fred Darling was absolutely ruthless. He was ruthless with horses and with men’.
I will repeat two stories from the book that makes me believe Fred Darling is not the right kind of character for racing to commemorate. ‘I shall never forget one morning, out on the gallops. A horse called Justification suddenly went savage. He got one of the boys down and went for him.’ Darling’s response, once the horse was caught, was to hit him hard across the knees to bring him down. Then he got on the horse’s head and gave him a tremendous beating. Sir Gordon said it was the only thing to do, even though it seemed cruel, and thought Darling brave. I thought Darling a greater savage than the horse.
Darling’s head lad, described by Sir Gordon as ‘the best Head Lad I have ever known’, was in the Home Guard with Darling his senior officer. Fred Templeman was in charge of a post on the Downs. One evening finding all was quiet Templeman slipped into Devizes for a quick pint. When Darling visited the post and found Templeman absent he was far from sympathetic. In fact not only did he dismiss him from the Home Guard he sacked him as an employee. Templeman died shortly afterwards. Sir Gordon thought from a broken heart. As Sir Gordon described Darling, ruthless with horse and man.
In Sir Gordon’s day tyrannical behaviour was allowed to prosper, with selfishness and arrogance alloyed to respect and no doubt fear. It was a different time, perhaps in its way a better age in which to live and perhaps we should not make judgement on that we do not fully comprehend. But that does not mean we can gloss over cruelty to man and beast. Whereas Sir Gordon deserves to have a good race named after him, I just do not think we should flatter the reputation of someone like Darling, no matter how great his career.

​I’ll be honest; Champions Day fails to float my boat. Don’t get me wrong; it is a good day’s racing, with races to anticipate and with the prospect this year of Aidan O’Brien achieving something truly memorable. But CHAMPIONS day. A day of champions? It doesn’t exactly do what is written on the tin.
It is the overarching title that grates with me. At the Cheltenham Festival horses are crowned champions through winning races that are most definitely championship races: 2-mile Champion Chase; Champion Hurdle; the Gold Cup; the Champion Stayers, for instance. The whole season weaves its magical way to Prestbury in March. It is an organic passage through winter, as if set out in stone since all of eternity by the sporting gods. Flat racing has a dozen cracking good meetings throughout the season yet not one of them mirrors what is achieved at Cheltenham. The flat season does not ‘weave its magical way’ to Champions Day. No horse is trained all year with Champions Day in mind unless, of course, injury has prevented it from taking in the big races throughout the summer.
Champions Day has the feel of something contrived; invented by the marketing department more for the sake of money and publicity than clarity. No horse will truly be crowned ‘Champion’, even though the five divisions of the season-long Qipco Championship will have winners ascribed to them, though the names of those horses will in quick time be forgotten. Or at least in reference to the Qipco Championship.
For starters Enable will not be there and no one doubts that she is the true champion of 2017. If Cracksman wins the Champion Stakes by ten lengths he will not be crowned champion; he will still lag behind his illustrious stable-mate. If Harry Angel wins the sprint then yes he will be the leading sprinter of the year. But what if The Tin Man or Quick Reflection wins? Does that make either of them a champion?
Since 2011 Champions Day has been labelled the ‘end of season highlight’ which, as it is the final big pay day of the season, I suppose it is. But it pales by comparison to any of the five days of Royal Ascot. Or indeed any one day of any of the big festivals throughout the season. And there will be no significant overseas raiders, destroying any comparison to the Breeders Cup, the meeting it was supposed to mimic. I very much doubt if Champions Day is much talked about in countries other than Britain and Ireland. You might have thought £4-million in prize money would have tempted foreign competition. But no, it remains very much a home-grown event. I doubt if £10-million on offer would tickle the fancy of owners and trainers from abroad.
In 2012, to give the day the greatest endorsement possible, Frankel won the Champion Stakes. He drew a crowd of 32,000. That is in the ball park of Cheltenham Festival attendance. Unfortunately no horse anywhere near his calibre – if that could be likely – has graced the day since. And I dare say 32,000 will remain the top attendance for a very long time into the future.
On Saturday the racing will be exciting and perhaps memorable but the only champions on parade will be human and we can see them in action every day until the end of the season. They have even made the crowning of the Champion Jockey into a controversial topic as it likely that Adam Kirby or Luke Morris will end the year having ridden more winners than Sylvester De Sousa. It is plainly absurd to not include every race of the flat turf season when deciding who is champion, while including every all-weather race during the period that decides the championship.
What is required is the well-intentioned Qipco Championship Series to fade into history. The races that fall under its umbrella will still remain, as they did before the Series came into being, with, hopefully, the Qipco name prefacing race-names that reflect the overarching title of the day. The Qipco Six-Furlong Championship. The Qipco Mile Championship. The Qipco 2-mile Championship. And so on and so forth.
Personally I do not see the point of a Champions Day that does not set out to attract the true equine champions of the season. To my way of thinking there is plenty enough prize money at the top end of the pyramid. It is the lower end that needs bolstering and that £4-million the high and mighty will trouser on Champions Day might achieve a greater benefit for racing if it were spent on prize money at racecourses that we never see on the television. £4-million pound would finance a heck of a lot of £20,000 handicaps.
The day comes to a conclusion with a concert by George Ezra, whoever he happens to be.

​The world of finance is as much a mystery to me as the things scientists study using an electron microscope, and I am not really sure what one of those does or even looks like. Money, too, is a dark and slippery commodity to me. As are numbers. In fact if there is such a condition as number dyslexic then I have it. Bye the bye, you would have thought the word describing the condition of having difficulty with words would be short and without y’s or x’s and easy to say, or remember. Though in this perverse world that we live in I dare say dyslexics have no trouble reading the world dyslexic. Less trouble, perhaps, than I have spelling the word!
Square roots, algorithms or even Roman numerals pass me by in a similar manner to which high or fast flying birds do when I am trying to identify them.
So my next great idea may be easily torn to shreds by those of you with a university education. Or indeed any education that afforded you half-decent grades in mathematics or applied physics.
When I read the report in the Racing Post on the 4-million guinea yearling filly bought by Godolphin something that at the time I could not put into words irked me. On the way in to work today that idea manifested. What does racing financially get out of the auction price of the 4-million guinea baby? It doesn’t even get good publicity as anyone outside of the sport reading about a 4-million guinea horse will assume that racing must be awash with money and the combined envy of the masses will stretch from here to Saturn and back, with mainstream media more interested in the rumours of back-handers and the laundering of crooked money. We must accept that racing is not understood by the outside community. Not even by other sports fans.
It seems unfair on the much criticised betting industry that it is expected to put money into racing’s finances when the breeding industry, or at least I believe, operates in splendid isolation. The vendors of million dollar babies get their profit; Tatts, Goffs etc get their commission, which I should imagine is substantial and owners of half-brothers and sisters to the 4-million and other million dollar yearlings reap the reward of association. Yet racing, seemingly, gets not a sou.
Stallions are made commercial and profitable largely through winning races and prize money. The value of mares is enhanced in a similar manner. In fact the breeding industry, at least at the top end, is fuelled by horse racing. One could not survive without the other. It is on the racecourse that reputations and investments are won and lost. Is it asking too much to expect the breeding industry to give a little back? A strong, vibrant racing scene must be good news for all sectors of the sport, and prize money that challenges the purses of races abroad is central to securing racing’s long-term well-being.
So why not impose a 1% or 2% levy on the purchase price of yearlings and mares to help fund horse racing. By my very sketchy workings-out, using Google, obviously, the sale of the 4-million guinea baby, if 2% went to fund horse racing, would net £84,000. Hardly the value of one of the bids in the battle between Coolmore and Godolphin to buy the filly.
I leave more intelligent people to figure out how much additional revenue would fall into racing’s coffers if my idea could be turned into a runner. I have no doubt that if my idea was, in any shape or form, put up for debate the wailing and gnashing of teeth from breeders would be heard the length and breadth of the land. As it was when bear-baiting, cock-fighting and no doubt hanging, drawing and quartering, were banned. All activities that were once, long long ago, associated with a good day out at the races.

​There was no Cambridgeshire Handicap in 1942. In 1940 & 1941 the race was run at Nottingham as the ‘New Cambridgeshire Stakes’ and was won by Caxton and Rue de la Paix. In 1939 it was run as two races, the Class 1 and Class 2, the winners being Gyroscope carrying 7st 7lb and Orivalque carrying 8st 10lbs. There was also no Cesarewitch in 1942. The Champion Stakes was won by Big Game and the Middle Park by Ribbon
In 1920 a Mr.Hornung bought Corporal out of a seller at Newmarket for 2,500 guineas, at the time a record price.
Owing to the General Strike in 1926 a number of meetings were abandoned, including the ‘Jubilee’ and the ‘Newmarket Stakes.
In 1925 Mr. A. K. Macomber won both the Cesarewitch and the Cambridgeshire with Forseti and Masked Marvel respectively.
The 2,000 Guineas of 1942 was won by His Majesty’s Big Game, ridden by Gordon Richards. Gordon also won the corresponding 1,000 Guineas on His Majesty’s Sun Chariot. The Derby of 1942, run at Newmarket as the ‘New Derby’ was won by Lord Derby’s Watling Street ridden by Harry Wragg. The corresponding Oaks, also ran at Newmarket, was won by His Majesty’s Sun Chariot ridden by Gordon Richards.
Two horses have won the Ascot Stakes with the name Scullion, once in 1902 and the other in 1924. Should not have been allowed then and should not be allowed today.
The last race meeting at Hampton was in 1877. The last meeting at Croydon was 1890. The highest price paid for a steeplechaser before 1942 was 10,500 guineas by Mr. W. H. Midwood for Silvo. The oldest 2-year-old race then, as it remains, is the July Stakes, first held in 1786.
When young Kitchener won the Chester Cup on Red Deer in 1844 he weighed 3st 7lbs. A few years earlier at Ascot he only weighed 2st 1lb.
Sea Song and Duece of Clubs twice dead-heated in a race at Sandown in 1888.
The last gelding to run in the Derby at Epsom was Claquer in 1901.
In 1942 there were only three racecourses that staged National Hunt racing due to war-time restrictions, Cheltenham (2 meetings), Wetherby (2 meetings) and Worcester (1 meeting). As usual at times of crisis the Irish raced on with 18 courses staging meetings, including the Curragh, Phoenix Park, Baldoyle and Rathkeale. The Irish Grand National of 1942 was won by the immortal (or least he should be) Prince Regent carrying 12st 7lbs. When it was suggested to Tom Dreaper many years later that Arkle was the best horse he ever trained it is said he looked to the stable that Prince Regent had graced and said with the sorrow of a man betraying an old friend. ‘I’m afraid he is’.
The New Year meeting at Cheltenham is interesting from the perspective of today for the jockeys who won races that day. Fred Rickaby won the selling hurdle beating Keith Piggott 3-lengths. The 4-miler (oh do bring it back Cheltenham) was won by Jack Dowdeswell who broke his collar bones so often he had them removed. The handicap hurdle went to Frenchie Nicholson, father of David and responsible for more champion jockeys than any man living or dead. And Keith Piggott (father of you know who) got his revenge on Fred Rickaby in the last beating him by a neck.
Mahmoud, the Derby winner of 1936 was sold to Mr. C. V. Whitney (Jock?) of New York for £20,000. Bahram, winner of the Triple Crown in 1935, was sold to an American syndicate for £40,000.
The smallest horse to win the Derby was Little Wonder in 1840 who measured 14 hands 3 and bit inches.
The top 2-year-old of 1942 was Lady Sybil at 9st 7lb, one pound more than Nasrullah.
In 1937 the Beckhampton Plate at Newbury had 51 runners. Those were the days, my son, those were the days.
All the miscellaneous facts above were gleaned from the 1943 edition of the Sporting Life Annual Summary of Past Racing, a little book I bought on-line by accident which throws up interesting facts of nostalgic quality every time I pick it up.

​For people who do earn their living from horse racing, the problem with rating horses by achievement and capability is that it is almost impossible to keep emotion and favouritism from clouding the issue. Coldly, perhaps without sufficient reflection time and no doubt with a wholly impartial eye, the Racing Post have come to the conclusion that in winning the Arc Enable achieved a rating of 129, a full point below Workforce, a decidedly average Group 1 horse. In fact, I had forgotten Workforce had won an Arc. Danedream, as easy an Arc winner as there has been in recent times, is rated a point below Enable.
Now, and I accept this without question, you can only make such assessments from the cold statistics that each Arc gives us. Enable beat Cloth of Stars 2 and a half lengths receiving 10lbs. She won easily. At no point in the race was any other result even remotely likely. But did she have 10lb in hand. Would she have won at level weights? Yes, I hear you say, Enable is 3-year-old, whereas Cloth of Stars and Ulysses are 4-year-olds, plus she is a filly, and is entitled to receive an allowance on account of her being weaker through being a year younger and weaker because she is a filly racing against colts.
Then there is the argument that though the opposition was good, this year’s Arc didn’t really sparkle with top-rank Group I horses. Cloth of Stars is undoubtedly a classy horse but he has never on any occasion made the heart flutter as Enable has done. Will he in the future? Ulysses is not a proven 1 and a half mile horse and Order of St.George is a stayer without a turn of foot.
I will apply the same argument to Sea The Stars, Racing Post’s top-rated Arc winner of recent years. Better, to my surprise, than Treve in 2013. Or perhaps any Arc winner.
My point is this: to determine an order of ‘greatness’ retrospection is required. Those who compile ratings should revisit their ratings every decade or so to determine how the beaten horses, and indeed the winners, fared in later races and in later seasons. Cloth of Stars may have run above himself or next season he might prove unbeatable, an Arc winner himself. Next year he will only have to give Enable 3lbs.
As anyone who has read my ramblings in the past will know – and I could bore for Queen & Country on the issue – I have a poor opinion of horses cited as champions, as ‘a horse of a lifetime’ as was attributed to Sea The Stars, who are retired to the stallion barn at the end of their 3-year-old season. Horses do not develop a full set of teeth until they are 5, which implies that it is impossible to know how good a horse was on the track if he is retired before he is fully matured, before it is his turn to give weight to younger horses. As I have said many many times, Sea The Stars, Dancing Brave, Nijinsky, and so on, were at best ‘the best of their generation’. We will never know how truly great they might have become because they were rushed off to stud before their value could be diminished by proving unable to give weight to younger rivals. (Nijinsky was rushed off to stud because his owner was dying and he wanted to see his foals)
Putting the cold light of statistical fact to one side and allowing emotion into the equation I would say Enable was a decisive winner of an average Arc. The eye and heart tells me she is at least the equal of Treve. She might be better. She certainly dominates her races in a way that Treve perhaps never did. But then Treve won two Arcs; and that is what Prince Khalid must allow Enable the opportunity to achieve. He proved with Frankel that a horse can be better at four than three. If he had kept him in training as a 5-year-old I am quite certain that the question of who is the greatest racehorse of all time would be rendered moot. And if a Sea The Stars were to appear next season he would be far easier to assess if he raced against Enable than he would if he only beat horses of his own generation or won the Arc receiving weight from older, if lesser, horses.
We must not go overboard with adulation for Enable. Like Sea The Stars and Dancing Brave she has only proved to be the best of her generation. Others will differ from my opinion, but she has an awful lot yet to prove if she is to be considered one of the all-time greats. And flat racing does not throw up that standard of racehorse very often. Before Frankel you have to go back to Brigadier Gerard and Mill Reef. Before that Ribot.
Frankie Dettori has hinted that Enable is the best he has ever ridden. I just hope that come this time next year he will not be hinting but stating the fact loud and clear