N.R.W., R.o.R & Generosity.

​It is National Racehorse week and another opportunity to enter a licenced trainers’ stable or any associated thoroughbred establishment to get close-up and personal with the horses and staff that make our sport unique.
I hope the public understand that a racing environment is a workplace and for them to be allowed access the daily routine must be altered, with, no doubt, an earlier start to the day for the staff and much organising during the preceding weeks to ensure the health and safety of the public and to put on a ‘show’ that both informs them, rights false impressions and offers a day to be remembered.
I am sure Richard Philipps and other will tell me why I am wrong but I do feel that a National Racehorse Month, with stables opening-up to the public over the course of 4 or 5 weekends might draw a larger response as in the main people work a 5-day week, Monday to Friday, making week-days difficult for these people to attend. It is not a criticism, just an observation.
I hope during this week the public are also made aware of the B.H.A.’s ‘Lives Well Lived’ campaign and all the equine activities retired racehorses can move on to after their racing careers have ended. I would like to see donation buckets at every stable open to the public this week, inviting people to donate to the equine charities that either rehome retired racehorses or those like the R.o.R. who retrain racehorses for future careers in show-jumping, eventing, dressage, polo or perhaps even just becoming a hack.
 It is the duty of everyone involved with racehorses, and that includes jockeys, I believe, to keep an eye on the horses who leave the racecourse for lives outside of the sport. The Grand National winner Hallo Dandy was found on a rubbish dump in poor condition and it was his rescue and rehabilitation that kickstarted the need for specific equine charities and has led the way to where we are now with ‘Lives Well Lived’ and all the marvellous charities that help racehorses into other equine activities.
It has been my belief that there should be a levy on every horse, from foal upwards, sold at public auction. Initially, and I still stand by my opinion, I thought this would be an excellent way of siphoning money from the sales ring through to prize-money on the racecourse. But as Lee Mottershead wrote in his column today in the Racing Post, perhaps s similar scheme could be used to fund the aftercare of racehorses.
Either option should be considered, though I would prefer, after a few seconds of thought, that it would help both human and horse if 1 or 2% of sales prices were taken to boost prize money and then a similar percentage of prize-money then gifted to the aftercare of retired racehorses. It remains ludicrous to me that breeders can receive 7-figure numbers for the sale of a yearling, and 6-figures when it comes to store horses and from boutique National Hunt sales, and for not one penny, yes, I know it is not all profit, returns to the racing side of the industry. From ‘birth to death’ should equally apply to breeders as it does to the owners and trainers of racehorses.
Finally, I wrote yesterday how Josephine Gordon winning the valuable mile handicap at Kempton on Saturday warmed my heart, now she has warmed it even warmer by donating her share of the prize-money to the fund set-up for the care of Alice Proctor, the amateur rider who suffered a severe spinal fracture at Cartmel a few months ago. I hope Josephine is not offended if I suggest she is far from the wealthiest jockey in the weighing room and to give away the largest bonus she has achieved in many a season is not, as she described it, ‘a little gesture’, but one of great generosity. It brought a tear to my eye and inspired me to go against my ‘look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves’ attitude and donate to the cause myself. Although her gesture I am sure was without thought of herself, I hope Josephine’s gesture inspires the racing fates to look kindly on her and her career returns to the upward trajectory of a few years ago.