​Richard Forristal writing in today’s (Sept 22nd) Racing Post echoed most of my thoughts regarding the Racing League, though he did so, obviously, far more eloquently and succinctly than I could ever achieve. To use a quote from his column, used on the front page of the paper, ‘A gimmick that celebrates mediocrity, its cheerleaders screaming for attention while the city around it burns’. A far better educated overview than one of my original comments ‘this is a kitten that needs drowning at birth’. That’s why he is paid handsomely for his thoughts, whilst I just prattle on in my own sweet time.
Anyone who thinks the Racing League is a step on the long road to survival of the sport should stick to watching and supporting mud wrestling, with or without the highly-skilled and doubtless poorly-paid scantily-clad young ladies for whom it is a breadwinner. And as for the comment from Jeremy Wray, the brains behind the team competition, and whose company/investors are still to make a profit from the Racing League – oh, yes, he’s not in it purely for the sake of the sport – ‘You never sit and say that’s the finished article – Twenty20 cricket evolved through several iterations before it got to where it is now’. Well, it may be doing well at the box-office but enthusiasts of the game believe in the long term it will kill off all serious aspects of the sport.
My view on the Racing League has not altered. Horse racing, outside a stable, a trainer and his owners and staff, is not a team game. Indeed, the whole concept of a team in horse racing is against the rules as every horse must run on its own merits and not impede other runners. With so much money up for grabs the temptation for a jockey to impede a competitor from another team in any manner that might escape the scrutiny of the stewards must be tantalising. Also, and this really sticks in my craw, the teams competing are fabrications, spurious, make believe and bogus. Team Wales and the West, for instance, that apparently won the event, have as little to do with the country of Wales and the part of England termed ‘the West’ as Swiss cheese, Wells Fargo or the Sargasso Sea.
Frankie Dettori rode for team Wales and the West. Jason Watson and Tom Marquand for Ireland. Some jockeys listed as team members didn’t turn up for a single ride throughout the contest. 
If the prize funds for the races in the Racing League were transferred to races already in the calendar field sizes would be similar. The comment by Andrew Dietz, the Racing Post’s defence correspondent, ‘Even the traditionalists must recognise that it provides incredibly competitive racing’, is not comparing the prize funds for the Racing League against similar races throughout the year of similar value.
The Racing League only proves how desperate the sport has become to remain relevant in today’s sporting landscape and how useless the B.H.A. and its tripartite partners have been over the past twenty-years at promoting and growing the sport, though the demise started way before the inception of the B.H.B., the forerunner of the B.H.A.
There is no way the Racing League can win new customers to the sport as the concept is so different to the traditional model. Let’s say, for example, Dai Jones, a true Welshman living in Devon, becomes a devoted fan of Team Wales and the West and for six fixtures he goes to every race meeting, backs every W and W runner. What’s he to do for the rest of the year. His ‘team’ disappears into the ether, the jockeys he has cheered on move on, they might not even be a part of the next R.L.. Dai might go to his local racecourse and find the racing different, alien to what he has come to enjoy. Even if the R.L. was to be a success and racing’s finances improve because of it, how do you transfer the concept to the day-to-day calendar. Do you eventually run the Derby as a team event, the Grand National, Royal Ascot, Cheltenham?
The purpose of the Racing League is to make money for Jeremy Wray and his company. End of.
I hated City Street Racing. I only dislike the Racing League. It is lurid in its concept; it will not fill racecourses because no one outside of the horses involved have any affiliation with the make-believe teams and any success it might breed cannot be transferred to the day-to-day of horse racing. Let it fade away in the same way all the teams disappeared after the last race at Newcastle.

​I wouldn’t suggest Michael Seth-Smith’s biography of Harry Wragg is poor in any way, though, to me, it only ranks as ordinary or okay. And, of course, the book was published back in 1984 and writing styles change over time, and perhaps, though he contributed his own accounts to the book, the subject didn’t give the writer all the insight he might of. Certainly, Harry Wragg’s contributions to the story-lines elevate the narrative as a fresh coat of paint brightens a room.
I am, no doubt, being disingenuous as the opening line of the acknowledgement makes it plain that Geoffrey Wragg, son and inheritor of his father’s stables on his retirement, approached the author at Newmarket in the spring of 1983 to write a biography of his father.
The foreword of the book was supplied by Lester Piggott who first rode for Harry in 1950 and Lester being Lester wished he had ridden Psidium for him in the 1961 Derby. Obviously, a Derby winner that slipped from Lester’s net. I would like to know how many ‘forwards’ Lester wrote over his lifetime, and what the charge was.
Harry Wragg rode in what for me is the mystical era between the two world wars, the era of Elliott, Carslake, Richards, Beary, Childs, etc, a time before I was born where the results, with the exception of classics both flat and jumping, are at best fuzzy in my mind, more like tomorrow’s results than yesterday’s. The contemporary jockeys of Harry Wragg wrote and spoke of horses that only exist for me in the lists of winners of great races and in the yellowed pages of ancient form-books. Because they read to me with the mystery of a whodunit must be the reason why I am so fascinated by the memoirs of jockeys and trainers who Harry Wragg would have associated with day-to-day.
Of course, I am more familiar with Harry Wragg as a trainer than a jockey and it proved how fallible my memory is nowadays to be reminded that he was perhaps even more successful as a trainer than he was as a jockey. Through the 1960’s he trained so many horses whose names resonate still, though in a quiz I would have failed miserably to name the races they won. Sovrango, Violetta, Miralgo, Atilla, Twelth Man, Salvo, Chicago, Intermezzo, Full Dress, Moulton, Furioso and Lacquer, the last horse to do the Irish 1,000 Guineas/Cambridgeshire double, and in the same year. Trainers and owners had a different mindset back in those days. No modern trainer would even consider running a classic winner in a handicap and would be thought half-mad even for entering a Group 1 winner in such a race.
Harry Wragg rode in 11,658 races in Great Britain and Ireland (no evening races, then, remember) during his career, winning 1,774 and was champion jockey in 1941. His best season was ten-years earlier when he won 110 races. As a trainer he was remarkably consistent with his lowest score being 21 in1971 and his highest 46 in 1955. His best year for prize-money was his last, 1982, £259,572.
What I liked about this book is that Harry comes out of it an honest man, with integrity and most definitely a horseman. On page 119, for instance, he tells a story about the King’s filly Sun Chariot and how temperamental she could be. At one point her trainer Fred Darling was even thinking of taking her out of training and returning her to the National Stud, from where the King had leased her. Harry describes how the filly ducked out with him on the way to the gallops and Fred Darling threatened to ‘thrash the life’ out of her with a long tom. As the trainer played hell, Harry said to him, ‘Well, now, if you’d told me this sort of thing would happen, I could have avoided it’. And he took the filly back to where they started, telling the trainer that it would not happen again. And it didn’t, at least not when Harry was riding her.
Incidentally, during the war Harry was a serving soldier, stationed around the Newmarket area and could only ride when he was allowed leave and that was usually only when he had completed a full shift with his unit. Modern jockeys have it so easy, don’t they?

​It can justifiably be said that no one is irreplaceable. Yet the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elisabeth has shown those of us in the horse racing fold that extraordinary people can be irreplaceable. Her Majesty is irreplaceable.
Our sport is blessed with such people as Sheikh Mohammed and his family, J.P. McManus, the Aga Khan, and others, and before them similar wealthy and enthusiastic breeders and owners. Yet each great benefactor of the sport was replaced, even if only in time, by other generous benefactors, though whether National Hunt will ever see someone of the quality of J.P. McManus again is unlikely, one must presume.
Her Majesty Queen Elisabeth is that rare human being who, if only to our sport, will prove irreplaceable. For all of her reign she has owned and bred racehorses and as with all similar competitors in this sport she achieved great highs and suffered the lowest of lows. Horse racing is a bedevilling leveller, treating everyone in its thrall with equality, as was proved when her final runner was beaten a short head. Horse races bestows no favours, not even on royalty or prime ministers, as Winston Churchill discovered.
The Queen adored horses, ponies, equines of all disciplines, with the thoroughbred racehorse holding a special place in her heart and I would recommend Julian Muscat’s book ‘Her Majesty’s Pleasure’ for full documentation of her lifelong love affair with the horse and horse racing. She gravitated naturally towards horseman and took absolute delight in visiting the stables of those blessed to be on her roster of trainers, with everyone having a story to tell about her sense of humour and her knowledgeable interest in each of their training methods. In ‘Her Majesty’s Pleasure’ I am pretty sure someone is quoted as saying that the Queen was a frustrated racehorse trainer.
I am sure once the period of mourning has finished, the royal horses will return to the racecourse and it would be happily received if one of them won one of the remaining major races of the season, the Cambridgeshire, perhaps, with Saga. And let’s hope one of her 2-year-olds gives the impression of being a classic horse for next season to set ablaze the Queen Consort’s anticipation. The Queen may have won 4 out of the 5 classics in her time as an owner but I for one craved an Epsom Derby winner for her and was as heart-broken as she must have privately been when Carlton House was somewhat of an unlucky loser. I believe Ryan Moore’s first words to Her majesty on dismounting was an apology for costing her a Derby winner. She replied something along the lines of ‘That is racing’. Exactly the same tone as her mother took when Devon Loch did his leap into nowhere when winning the Grand National was only a few strides away.
There will never be another, not for horse racing, and Charles the third – I am having great difficulty coming to terms with having a new monarch – has a very hard act to follow. I wish him peace, good fortune and a long reign. I also wish him, if the royal horses are to run in his name, a Derby winner to complete the full set for Her Majesty’s Sandringham stud.

​Last Sunday was undoubtedly a brilliant day of racing. But why was there no comment, negative or positive, on the scheduling of two St.Legers on the same day, let alone within the same hour. Yes, it is a valid argument that as one is restricted to 3-year-olds and the other open to older horses in effect they do not in reality clash to any extent. Yet the English St.Leger is in serious decline, with the class of horse running in the race hardly acceptable for the final leg of the Triple Crown, the fifth of five classics. The classier St.Leger last Sunday was indubitably the Irish version, which is another argument that cannot be denied.
I have long argued that if the Eclipse were to be restricted to 3-year-olds and upgraded to the fifth classic, the season would be better balanced, with the Sandown race quite possibly the definitive 3-year-old race of the season, with, perhaps, the winners of both Guineas, Derby and Oaks, candidates for entry. Whereas the Doncaster St.Leger is more of a consolation race, with the winner rarely going on to greater successes the following season.
A classic season that takes in 2 races of a mile, 2 mile-and-a-half races and one over 1 mile 2-furlongs, would be far more appropriate to horse racing of today than the present arrangement of 4 classics run by the first week of June, with the St.Leger a tail-end Charlie in September.
Instead of allowing the Doncaster St.Leger to become less and less relevant as the decades slip by, when once it was the natural staging post for Derby winners, with the winner destined for the following season’s Ascot Gold Cup, why wouldn’t the B.H.A. and Doncaster show some ambition by upgrading it to an alternative to the Arc, though over a rather longer trip? Yes, this requires my radical proposal to reinvent the Eclipse as a classic race to be agreed upon and for a sponsor willing to invest a whole heap of prize money to ensure the new race got off the ground, with a date in the calendar that doesn’t fall on the same day as Irish Champions Weekend. And why shouldn’t British racing have a brand-new international horse race? Every other racing province around the world continually invents new races with the purpose of enticing foreign invaders to their shores and to improve their ‘brand’.
Eldar Eldarov was a perfectly satisfactory winner at Doncaster and we can but hope he becomes a serious challenger to Kyprios next season. I suspect, though, especially with Trueshan putting in a rare poor run in the Doncaster Cup and Stradivarius getting older by the day, that Kyprios, barring accidents, will rule supreme in the stayers division for as long as Coolmore want to campaign him.

Lester Piggott was quite rightly lauded as one of the best flat jockeys of all-time, if not the best. But why isn’t Ryan Moore appraised in a similar fashion? I am sure in time, when Ryan bows out, William Buick and Tom Marquand will be heralded as two of the best in the world. But at the moment we are blessed with race-riding masterclasses on a weekly basis by Ryan.
On any given day I will claim Frankie Dettori is the best I have ever seen – I always hated Lester’s riding technique and how hard he could be on a horse – while on any other given day I will claim Ryan Moore as the best I have seen. One thing I am sure of is that Ryan is by far the more consistent of the two, making fewer, if any, mistakes than Frankie, with his work ethic also far in excess of Frankie’s, though the Corsican may exert more energy in the gym than Moore. Time better spent, I would think, riding as many horses on the track than he allows himself at present.
Finally, as an example of how far in arrears British racing is when it comes to prize money, at Sha Tin last Sunday there were two handicaps worth £187,000, won by Silvestre de Sousa, by the way, and another worth £142,000. There wasn’t a race at the meeting worth less than £43,000 to the winner. On the debit side, there wasn’t a race over more than a mile and there was only one at the distance, the rest being 5, 6 and 7-furlongs.

​My apologies for referring back to one the most damaging stories to emerge from horse racing in the past decade. At least in my opinion. When Bryony Frost accused Robbie Dunne of bullying behaviour, an accusation an independent panel found to be substantially proven, Dunne’s friends in the weighing room in giving evidence on his behalf, suggested the weighing room was a homely, loving place, where everyone got along just fine. Similar sentiments were expressed in the Racing Post and by Charlie Deutsch on I.T.V. Racing after winning a race at Cheltenham.
Yet, in his excellent article in Monday’s (Sept 5th) Racing Post, airing his views on the interference rules, Paul Hanigan suggested otherwise. He wrote: There are some good people in the weighing room but also some who aren’t very nice. He later wrote: The weighing room used to be a safe haven but there are times now when it is a horrible place. There are arguments, shouting and bawling after races every day.
His overtone, though he makes no mention of the Frost/Dunne affair, is that since Dunne was hauled over the coals for his bullying of a female jockey, the senior jockeys are now scared of raising instances of bad/dangerous riding committed by young riders during a race, incidents they were aware of but stewards had missed. If this is true, and why would a respected jockey like Hanagan make such a claim if it was not based on factual evidence, then we must assume that neither the Professional Jockeys Association nor the B.H.A. have instigated any new protocols to deal with the sort of incidents highlighted by Paul Hanagan. 
What is off about all this is that young jockeys almost always have jockey coaches nowadays. Would it not be sensible to have contact numbers for jockey coaches, with the names of the jockeys they coach, on a message board within the weighing room? Then, when a young jockey has erred for whatever reason during a race, one of the senior jockeys, or a jockey nominated to deal with such matters, could contact the coach of the young jockey involved, draw his attention to the incident or even just poor riding skills, and leave the matter for him to make good.
The past may have been ‘the good old days’ but surely it was always wrong for a senior jockey to take a young lad to one side to give him nine lashes of his indignation, to frighten the living daylights out of him, even if it was done for the safety of everyone concerned.
Paul Hanagan, followed-up by many of his colleagues, have voiced their opinion that the lack of consistency by stewards when it comes to the interference rules is the main reason for the present spate of dangerous incidents occurring around and by young jockeys. He even admits to being in the wrong in the Norfolk Stakes at Royal Ascot, even though an independent panel finally ruled in his favour, allowing the connections of The Ridler to keep their ‘ill-gotten’ spoils.
As Hanagan admits, only disqualification of jockeys winning races by pushing the interference rules close to breaking point will provide the remedy he and other jockeys are looking for. Clarity, is the correct description here, I believe. A change to the interference rules that jockeys believe in, with no wriggle room as is so often the case with the B.H.A.
The culture in weighing rooms that Paul Hanagan writes about fits squarely with Bryony Frost’s testimony during the B.H.A. inquiry. One, of course, must assume the culture would be similar in the weighing rooms of both the jump jockeys and their counterparts on the flat. It is sad to think of the weighing room being a hive of discord when the people who assemble there are the heroes of the sport, men and women who the racing enthusiast see as brave and courageous, stout and true.
Of course, jockeys are only human, they will make mistakes, lose their sense of perspective, see red in times of stress, and be quick to point out the faults of others while at the same time not admitting to their own faults. It is chastening, though, to realise that nothing has been achieved to cancel the sort of behaviour Robbie Dunne was guilty of; that no one has been appointed arbiter of disputes, charged with the simple task of contacting the relevant jockey coach and leaving the matter-in-hand for him to deal with. That is an unhappy truth, a fault of everyone within the hallowed sanctum of the weighing room.

​Writing in 1975, the retired trainer Joe Hartigan made this observation: As we are today, the policy seems to be, ‘Let the rich get richer and the poor get poorer’. However, as the vast majority are in the poorer bracket, it seems only a matter of time before the pendulum swings to help the small men. Otherwise, it will mean a dozen trainers, and a handful of millionaires as owners, will control racing, and that will bore us all.
In hindsight, of course, it was the wisdom of Solomon and as can be expected his warning went unheeded, perhaps, at the time, even derided.
Two years later, he wrote an addendum to the book which has proved equally astute: Since I first sat down to write this book (To Become A Racehorse Trainer) the Trainers lot has changed more than at any time in our racing history. Lads wages continually increase. Fodder goes up by leaps and bounds. Mr. Tom Blackwell’s Report suggests a minimum training charge, and for an alteration to the apprentice indenture system. On the brighter side there is to be a slight increase in the overall stake money. In view of these changes, and no doubt countless more to come, I have not rewritten in order to catch up. If I did so, I fear that I might discourage the new young trainer even further and that as you know is not my intention. ‘I never promised you a rose garden’.
Prophetic words. You’ll doubtless agree.
To allude to the book ‘To Become A Racehorse Trainer’ for a short paragraph. As a historical overview of the sport the book is excellent and, in some ways, as long as the young, prospective trainer, is of an optimistic mindset, the book possesses a mine of useful advice. Sadly, Joe Hartigan’s misgivings of a career he loved remain as relevant today, sadly, perhaps unforgivably, as they were back in 1975.
As Emanual Macron told the French people, ‘The days of abundance are over’. Whether he gave any explanation for his dire warning or any advice on how to survive the new status quo, I cannot say. Yet that same phrase may well apply to horse racing around the world. This sport, as I repeatedly say, is a working-class sport underpinned by the wealth and enthusiasm of the mega-rich. If the rich lose their wealth who or what will underpin or finance the sport, and without wealthy owners what will happen to the working classes that oil the wheels of equine industry?
Where are the captains of this industry who might right the ship, to keep it afloat, to offer the coordinated response to the cost-of-living crisis that might yet sink our great sport to the sea-bed of yesterday’s way of life.
The publication of the 2023 racing calendar was a prime example of lazy governance. While the B.H.A. were putting together next year’s race programme, all the problems of today and beyond were in the public domain, yet they were either in ignorance of the financial problems of the world or blithely took the view to carry on regardless.
By common consent, there is too much racing, so the B.H.A. have given the sport exactly the same problem to deal with next year, with no regard to the possibility that the tribulations of next year might be the straw that finally breaks the camel’s back.
Here are three proposals that might ease the sport’s financial woes, or at least the financial woes of racecourse executives, and I will not include the bloody obvious suggestion of cutting 500 or more races from the calendar, if only on a temporary basis.
Number one: electricity prices will be a huge drain on racecourse finances. So, no floodlight racing for one, two or three seasons. It must be hugely expensive to power floodlights, so eliminating this outlay can only be of benefit to everyone, including betting shops as they no longer would need to stay open past naturally occurring daylight hours. It would also be of benefit to stable staff for obvious reasons.
Number two: on the same theme, no evening racing with the exception of during the summer months. The use of electricity must be sparing, with racecourses perhaps investing in a turbine or solar panels to cut costs and power all their electrical needs.
Number three: here I am making an assumption, which may be false, though being wrong has never stopped me airing my thoughts in the past and will not do so now. It must be more expensive overall to set-up a racecourse for racing for ten, say, one-day meetings, than it would be for a two-or three-day meetings, so I propose as few one-day meetings as possible.
There must be a hundred or more ways, some small, some substantial, for racecourses to save money in order to ensure they can pay their staff and maintain the racecourse and its facilities in a fit state to be able to open the gates to the public and the racing community. But where is the B.H.A. with a ready plan, a task force to lead the sport to healthier times. In its history, racing has had to navigate its way through other troubled times, for instance, after two world wars, yet for all their faults, the Jockey Club had the authority and concern for the sport to lead the way. I only wish I had the same confidence in this damn tripartite group to come together and speak as one voice. 

​Those of us who believe, as I do, that British horse racing is in dire straits should be fearful of what is in store for us in the very near future. The cost-of-living crisis has the potential to irreparably damage our sport. The cost to racecourses to stage a race-meeting will increase at the same rate as peoples disposable incomes decreases, with far fewer people able to afford to attend a race meeting. With the government’s attack on betting, coupled with the same decrease in disposable income, will certainly lower the amount of money returned to racing from off-course bookmakers. As we enter 2023, a perfect storm of damaging consequences will sweep through our sport. Owners will feel the pinch, with the big battalions cutting back their strings, the syndicates, as a result of losing members, will cut back in similar percentages and the one-horse owner will, doubtless, disappear. Trainers will go broke, staff will be lost from the industry and jockeys will have more time to polish their own tack as, other than those with well-paid retainers, not so many of them will be able to afford the assistance of valets.
When they published the 2023 race calendar, the B.H.A. displayed a complete disregard (or ignorance) of what is going on in the world. Less, on this occasion, would definitely have been more beneficial to the sport.
The best suggestion so far has come from Roger Charlton and it should have generated debate amongst the racing public. It didn’t, at least not in my realm of observation.
Capping the number of horses any one trainer can have in his/her stables will contribute to solving two of racing’s greatest concerns. Number 1, it will keep more trainers financially viable, and Number 2, it will spread good staff amongst a greater number of trainers.
Of course, the first conundrum to solve is where to cap the numbers. Pre-government restrictions I would have suggested 150, though taking into account the negativity of what I have written at the outset of this piece, 100 might be the starting-off point. I would suggest that the Gosdens, Johnstons, William Haggas, Richard Hannon, etc, could begin the process by upping their training fees as this would immediately trigger some owners going in search of a cheaper alternative. It must be realised that every trainer must be allowed to make a profit and less horses will doubtless confer less in the coffers of the wealthier men and women of the training ranks.
Next trainers must decide which horses, and perhaps owners, they can get by without. Of course, for example, The Gosdens’ may honour the restriction only to find within a month they have only 95 active horses on their books as 5 have gone lame on them. Do they ask for 5 of their former in-mates to return or do they call-up one of their major existing owners to send along replacements? And then what happens when 1 or all of the 5 lame horses return to soundness?
Yet the benefits, to my eyes, far outweigh the complications of capping. This restrictions should only be approved for a fixed short-term period of time. I would suggest 3-years. At least long enough to see the sport through the heavy swell of gut-busting inflation. Trainers who at the moment are scraping by will receive a fresh intake of horses, with many receiving a boost in the class of horse they train. And with the horses will come the staff laid off by trainers forced to reduce their string.
In some ways the reallocation of staff may well be of the greatest benefit to the sport. The smaller trainer has always had difficulty in obtaining and holding on to good staff. It is a problem written about by Joe Hartigan, Dick Hern’s predecessor at West Ilsley, back in 1975. In fact, he predicted the situation we have now where a select few trainers have all the best horses. The education and care of horses will improve, trainers income will see an upswing and races will be more competitive as horses will be spread over a greater number of trainers and not kept apart as the case can be now.
The capping of numbers in any one stable is not a win-win scenario. The larger stables will lose out, if temporarily, as will their retained jockeys but the sport in particular will be given a greater chance of survival, a survival that in ten-years-time might lead to prosperity. Though only, of course, if horse-racing’s numb-headed/self-absorbed stakeholders can get their heads in sync and source a funding stream that will level up the sport in this country with our competitors abroad.

​‘BRIGADIER GERARD AND ME’,
BY LAURIE WILLIAMSON.

Let me start by one of the only criticisms I have of this book. Like the majority of self-published books, and this applies to me every bit as it applies to Laurie Williamson, this is a book sorely in need of a professional editor and proof-reader. 
The tag-line of the book is ‘A Personal Journey Through Horse Racing’. This is stretching a point somewhat as it is first and foremost a biography of a horse, Brigadier Gerard, and secondly it is a blistering attack on ratings and the people who compile ratings. Laurie Williamson, if you are not aware, was the ‘lad’ who looked after Brigadier Gerard throughout his career. Indeed, when the Brigadier was retired, Laurie Williamson took his leave from the sport. Any horse after ‘the greatest ever flat racehorse’ was always going to be an example of ‘after the Lord Mayor’s Show’. His departure from West Ilsley had ramifications that only add to the disrespect John Hislop earned for himself during his lifetime. You must read the book to appreciate the meaning of the word ungrateful and the phrase meanness of spirit,
Because of this book, I now have in my racing library books by or concerning the owner, trainer, jockey and stable lad, of Brigadier Gerard. Four books that must now sit side-by-side on the shelf.
Because this book is self-published, with a good amount of the pages taken up in criticism of Timeform, the handicappers at the B.H.A. and individual journalists when the author believes Brigadier Gerard is not accorded the respect he deserves, the book will not receive the glowing reviews  it richly deserves. I was once told by a well-known racing author (alright, I’ll name him, Sean Magee) that every book needs mud on the page to sell. This book has dollops of mud. Laurie Williamson has an axe to grind and boy does he do a good job of it. And he does it with facts, lots of them, and long-lived sentiment. He loved the Brigadier and this book is his quest to have him remembered as the ‘greatest of all-time’.
Although I am 100% on his side when it comes to Brigadier Gerard, I do not agree with his evaluation of Frankel. The data and charts he uses to prove his point are impressive and really unarguable. It is simply that the heart has as much to do with the awarding of greatness as the head. I was not, in retrospect (and this is where ratings, to use my terminology, are bollocks) blown away by Frankel’s 2,000 Guineas win. He beat nothing worthy of Group I with ease. Indeed, throughout his career Frankel beat no horse of any great merit. In beating Mishriff, Baaeed has achieved more than Frankel. But, and it is a very big but, in winning the International at York he made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end and flat horses do not ordinarily do that to me. My heart told me that Frankel had been, up to that day, been running over the wrong trip.
I also have a bias against 3-year-olds being given the accolade of greatness. But that’s a whole different topic.
I will not steal Laurie Williamson’s thunder by reciting here the data and facts he uses to prove his point, though as an appetiser I will give you the startling fact that between them Nijinsky, Dancing Brave, Frankel and Sea the Stars broke fewer course records than Mill Reef on his own and only equalled Brigadier Gerard’s score. 3 to Mill Reef, 2 to Brigadier Gerard and the four horses people have the temerity to suggest were superior to Mill Reef and Brigadier Gerard.
This book is worth buying if only for the charts and data provided by the author.
As with practically everyone, the author has hardly a kind word to say about John and Jean Hislop, though Dick Hern comes out of the book well and Joe Mercer especially so.
I loved this book and you will too if you forgive the misplaced commas. Of course, this book is written with as much bias as affection and I love that too about the book. Obviously, I cannot know if the manuscript of this book was offered to Racing Post Books but if it was and they turned it down they should consider contacting Laurie Williamson to offer the services of an editor and proof-reader. Everyone with an interest in horse racing should buy this book, even those firmly of the belief that a horse other than Brigadier Gerard should be accorded the honour of ‘greatest of all-time’.
I highly recommend this book. A worthy addition to the library of horse racing history.

​Should Baaeed finish his career in the Champion Stakes at Ascot? Or should he be allowed to strut his stuff in the Irish Champion Stakes, followed by a career-defining last race in the Arc? These are the questions being banded about in the Racing Post and I dare say out in the wider racing world.
Personally, I think these are entirely the wrong questions to be asking of Shadwell. My question would be this: why not keep him in training as a five-year-old?
Unlike the two horses who dominate my thinking as to which was the greatest flat horse of my lifetime, Brigadier Gerard and Frankel who both ran for three seasons, Baaeed has only raced for two. And in the course of those two seasons for the majority of his races he has had hardly to exert himself to confirm his status as the best around.
Again, personally, I do not believe he has achieved enough to be considered alongside Brigadier Gerard and Frankel. The Brigadier won fifteen races in a row before his baffling defeat to Roberto in what is now the Juddmonte International at York. Also, not only did Brigadier Gerard win over 12-furlongs, he also beat the best horse any of those considered by experts to be ‘great horses’ in the interim period. In beating Mill Reef by an extending 3-lengths, winning over distances from 5-furlongs to 12-furlongs and setting many course records, makes for a pretty solid argument for him being the greatest flat horse of my lifetime.
Yet, I have to admit, Baaeed could surpass the Brigadier’s achievements, though only if he is given the opportunity by his connections. By selecting the Champion Stakes at Ascot for his swan-song, Shadwell and William Haggas will be playing safe, protecting his commercial value as a stallion before the riskier alternative of allowing breeders to discover the full range of his abilities as a racehorse.
For all their unpopularity during their lifetime, with their reputations unrecoverable, it seems, since their passing, it is to their credit that John and Jean Hislop campaigned Brigadier Gerard with the sporting bravado that involved exposing him to possible defeat multiple of times. His breeding – he was by an unfashionable sire who was basically a miler – suggested he had little hope of staying 12-furlongs, yet the Hislops were determined, even after a hectic schedule as a 4-year-old, to run him in the King George & Queen Elisabeth and were equally determined to take on Mill Reef again.
As with Frankel, there is little doubt in my mind that Baaeed is a ten/12- furlong horse. When Frankel won at York, he won going away with his head in his chest. It was the biggest wow moment, on the flat, of my lifetime. It left an indelible impression on me and for a day or two I thought I would have to revise my opinion on Brigadier Gerard being my personal ‘greatest horse’. Baaeed was impressive at York, I concede, but I have my doubts whether the form truly adds-up to much.
To attract the top breeders and best mares, I doubt if Baaeed needs to achieve anything more as his reputation now goes before him. But for an ailing sport, wouldn’t it be the most marvellous gift if Shadwell rolled the dice and kept him in training for another season. Just one more season. They can have the pleasure and financial reward of Baaeed as a stallion for twenty-years or more, with reasonable luck, of course. One more year in training, though, would bring incalculable reward for the sport.
Keep Baaeed in training and the Eclipse, King George & Queen Elisabeth and Arc await to be added to his already impressive C.V. and with the added bonus that if the season rolls out as I predict he can be marketed as the universally acclaimed ‘greatest horse’.
I have always said that owners fortunate and blessed to own great horses have as much a responsibility to the sport that feeds them as to the horses they race. Shadwell have bred horses now for 40-years or more, if I am correct, yet Baaeed is the best of magnificent cohort of thoroughbreds. They will not breed a better one, that’s for sure. Despite their pompous claim that Brigadier Gerard was the result of great breeding knowledge, the Hislops got plain lucky. Juddmonte, as with Shadwell, have bred top-class horses for decades, yet they will never breed any horse better than Frankel. For all their longevity of success, Coolmore are yet to breed a horse that can be placed alongside the horses already mentioned. The same can be said for Godolphin.
Will Baaeed be kept in training for another year? Of course not. Commercial interests will take sway even though Baaeed is blessed with a kind temperament and is as easy a ride as a kids pony. But there we go. We can’t have everything can we?

​Look, I was sort of wrong. Baaeed won hard-held and my fancy Native Trail ran like a hairy dog in a monsoon. I hope he was dope-tested. I hope they find no suggestion of foul-play. And you can’t say he didn’t stay the distance in a strongly run race because he wouldn’t have won at any distance yesterday.
Baaeed is very, very good. How good we will never know as he is set to avoid the type of opposition that might make a race of it with him. Also, as with Frankel, as I suggested yesterday, it is at the very end of his career that we discover he has been running over the wrong distance for twelve-months. At no stage up till now has Baaeed been as impressive as yesterday.
But in all honesty what did the opposition amount to? Mishriff was always a Grade 1 performer, hoovering up mega big prize money in newly created races light on top-quality opposition. True, last year he won the Juddmonte International with the same ease as Baaeed yesterday but he is a horse that is beaten more times than he has won and yesterday he beat Sir Busker, Dubai Honour, a bitterly disappointing Native Trail and the habitually failing High Definition. Not stellar opposition, I would suggest.
I doubt if St. Nicholas Abbey would have been beaten as far as Mishriff.
That all said, Baaeed is the best around. I still believe the accolade of ‘best in the world’ is undeserved, as it would be for any horse as such a claim cannot be proved beyond any doubt. How good Baaeed is; where he stands in the history of the sport, we shall never know. Just as he is at his peak, when it is clear for all to see that all the top middle-distances races around the world are at his mercy, he is to be retired. British horse racing needs Baaeed in training next season, not covering mares. He can have that pleasure for the rest of his life. It is so sad that owners these days place commercial interests before sporting endeavour. John and Jean Hislop may have had few cheer-leaders during their lifetime, with their reputations mud since their passing, but credit where credit is due. They campaigned Brigadier Gerard without any real regard for his value at stud, placing emphasis on finding out his limitations so that breeders knew exactly what his qualities were. It is why despite his breeding, the Brigadier ran in the King George & Queen Elisabeth, why he ran on soft/heavy ground that he disliked and why they were considering keeping him in training as a five-year-old. Yes, they caved on the last aspiration but when he retired to stud breeders knew the sort of horse the Brigadier truly was, a horse of outstanding courage and rare ability, a winner from six-furlongs to twelve, on all types of ground.
Will they run Baaeed in the Champion Stakes if it comes up soft/heavy. Will they risk his reputation, risk him losing his unbeaten tag?
I have no criticism of Baaeed. He is a beautiful, uncomplicated horse. To use a phrase of Nicky Henderson’s, he appears a really nice person, a horse in the mould of Brigadier Gerard, at least temperament-wise. My moan is toward Shadwell for putting their own commercial interests before the health of the sport. Horse racing in this country needs Baaeed kept in training. Just as the people have accepted him as a champion he is be withdrawn from public view. Is it no wonder that in this country and Ireland National Hunt is so much more popular with the public than flat racing. Owners, especially those fortunate to own brilliant racehorses, have a responsibility as much to the sport as they do their horses.
But that said: wasn’t he impressive yesterday? And finally, Shadwell have a stallion to match Juddmonte’s Frankel and Godolphin’s Dubawi.