the thoroughbred - way back then.

​If the Gimcrack at York was altered to more truly represent and honour the horse it is named after the conditions would state no horse to run that is over 15-hands high. Gimcrack himself was only just over 14-hands. In todays terms he would be thought too small to bother with. Now that, Mr. O’Leary is a ‘rat of a thing’. And an almost white rat at that. He was, and perhaps what he should be famous for, the first British trained horse to win in France as in 1766 he won a match over the not insignificant distance of twenty-two and a half-miles, completing what today would be considered an endurance test in under the hour. If the same were attempted today there would be questions asked in Parliament.
Of course, in the early days of the sport most thoroughbreds were not true thoroughbreds, having quite a lot of working-class blood in their pedigree, some might have even ploughed the land. The best and most famous horses of the day were all comparatively small, if set against today’s racehorses. Eclipse was only 15-hands, 2 inches, whereas a horse named Magog was so named because at 16-hands he was considered a giant amongst horses. And back then horses were not raced as two-year-olds or even three-year-olds.
Eclipse, a horse whose name has resonated through every century since his death, did not race until he was five-years-old and had an unbeaten career that only lasted seventeen-months, changing ownership three times. It might be thought that he won what we might think of as ‘proper races’ but that is not the case. The first race he won was the excellent and grandly named Noblemen and Gentleman’s Plate at Epsom, a race that constituted three four-mile heats. In such races if the winner could ‘distance’ his opponents, that is win by more than 240-yards, he was spared running in the next heat. It was after this first heat that his flamboyant owner, Dennis O’Kelly made his now famous boast ‘Eclipse first, and the rest nowhere’, winning a bet where he said he could name the first three horses to finish.
Eclipse won ten-races, which would be all the more impressive if his reputation had not gone before him as six of those ‘races’ were in fact walkovers.
We, perhaps quite rightly, perhaps not, revere the name and reputation of Eclipse, though I doubt if he were alive today, even trained by a master like Aidan O’Brien or Sir Michael Stoute, whether he would cut much mustard in the races that matter. It is said he was the second great horse of the thoroughbred world, after Flying Childers, though if one was overly critical, he was perhaps only a big fish in a very small pool. A legend, undoubtedly, and a prolific and good sire, but not a truly great racehorse.
As the sport has progressed down through the centuries, and we are a sport that has a longer lineage than any other true and proper sport, a fact that shouldn’t be overlooked when journalists are proposing the sport’s future, speed has come ever more to the fore. It can be clearly evidenced from the dates the classic races were first run. The St.Leger 1776. The Oaks 1779. The Derby 1780. The 2,000 Guineas in 1809 and the 1,000 Guineas in 1814. It is surprising that a six-furlong ‘classic’ has not yet been proposed. When races over a distance short of a mile were first run they were described as ‘short races’ and were a novelty that I suggest were prophesied never to flourish. Now, sadly, they dominate.
Of course today horse racing is both an industry and a sport, with high-class thoroughbreds with blue-blooded pedigrees sought after as ‘investments’ by fabulously wealthy people with three-quarters of an eye on the breeding sheds and the escalation in value of their shares, with the racing of their ‘investments’ no doubt considered a risk that cannot be avoided. In the 18th century the prize was to be able to boast that your horse won more races than the horses of your friends. Whereas these days the classic races only form part of the equation. Pedigrees that have the famous names of the past in them, Hambletonian, Highflyer, Herod and of course Eclipse, are greatly prized, though in their day I doubt if breeders were quite so enamoured in what went before. Eclipse sired the winners of 344 races, dying aged 25. Stallions today would cover as many mares in three seasons. Stallions that shuttle between continents might reach that number in two covering seasons.
It is said by those who know about such things that the reason for the extraordinary vigour of his blood and the influence his name still holds when it comes to lines of descent is that he was allowed to mature before he was asked to race. The past, though, to use what has quickly become a hackneyed expression, is a different country and no breeder through choice would keep a horse about the stud doing nothing but looking fabulous. Tis a pity no one is bothering to experiment.