RUBAUD, CLIMATE AND CALENDAR & SAFFIE GOES TO HONG KONG.

I quite enjoy it when a horse is disregarded by television pundits, as with Rubaud yesterday, and then goes on to prove them the muppets that perhaps they are. Tom Scudamore and Mick Fitzgerald, as respected and talented as jockeys as they were, have no nerve when it comes to tipping, with both of them prone to selecting favourites, rather than going for a horse at a nice each-way price, with both of them yesterday, along with Luke Harvey, bolding proclaiming Rubaud a better hurdler than chaser. At the weights, though I kept it to myself, I thought Rubaud was well-in and had the right to be considered the best horse in the race. And didn't he stick it up to the I.T.V. punting panel, aided and abetted by a typically swashbuckling ride by Sam Twiston-Davies, now riding as well as he has ever done, at least in my opinion, he jumped almost in Frodon-style, which is best a compliment as I could ascribe to him. Given decent ground, the sort of ground that would keep Il Etait Temps at home, Rubaud might just bag the Tingle Creek, especially if Jonbon is now in need of 2m 4-furlongs if not 3-miles, as I believe, as does his trainer.

I am no Ruby Walsh, that goes without saying, though I say it anyway to save others the trouble. Ruby has an analytical mind and an observational eye, whereas my opinions and ideas come through instinct, with an eye that could miss a twelve-foot, decorated, Christmas Tree in a twelve-foot square room. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred Ruby is right in his judgement and only a fool would take him on in a debate about anything from aardvarks to xylophones. That gives a people a chance if the subject for debate is Zimbabwe, zithers or zygapophysis.

Today, in the Racing Post, his lecture is on climate change and why racing authorities should be changing the racing calendar to meet the demands of changing weather patterns. It was an expertly and for most part easily readable essay, and I recommend everyone to seek it out, especially those who work for Horse Racing Ireland and the British Horseracing Authority. If there is a weakness in his opinion it lies in his ommission of 1975 and 1976, two-years in Britain where dry weather defeated wet weather by a score of 2 to 1, leading the water table to drop to crisis proportions. It was the lack of rain in the winter of 75 that lead to the drought of 76, not the lack of rain in the summer of 76. I believe, and again this thought is based as much on instinct as it is on the drought of 1976, a period almost always ignored by climate experts as it drives a coach and horses through the climate change argument, that we will not see another summer of 2026 for another fifty-years or so, though if the eighteen-month period between 1975 and 1976 is to be repeated, a lack of rainfall this winter will make the drough of last year look pretty puny by comparison.

I do not contest that weather patterns have changed in the past few years, perhaps the past decade, as they have, doubtless, since the first asteroid hit the Earth. After the 2nd World War, Britain was hit by a severe winter storm, with snow up past the knees of short men. In 1963 sport, except for winter sports, was abandoned everywhere from Cornwall to the Scottish Highlands, with snow up around the necks of most basketball players. In 1968 (?) we had another snowy winter and the climate experts were happily predicting a new ice age. And this is something Ruby should take into account - climate scientists have always got their future weather predictions wrong. Go research the subject. 

Not that Ruby wrote one word out-of-place in outlining his remedy for the present change in weather patterns. The racing calendar does require a re-jig, with the core jumping season finishing, as Dan Skelton proposed, with the Aintree National fixture - that is not part of the Ruby Plan, though it makes sense if the racing calendar is to revolutionised. I do think his article in today's paper needs to be read by as many people as possible so that a debate can be started on this very important subject and it is not not for me to analysise and deconstruct his thoughts and remedies. Largely he is bang on the money and you do not need to be either a climate sceptic or a climate change advocate to appreciate the commonsense in his lecture-cum-article. Ruby is one of the great men of our sport; he should be listened to.

The wondrous Saffie Osborne is currently, and until Christmas, in Hong Kong, her fame and status in the sport such that she will betaking in the Longines International Rider Championship alongside Ryan Moore, Dylan Brown Macmonagle and James McDonald. On her first day on active service in Hong Kong, at Happy Valley, she is booked for ten-rides on the eleven-race card. As the reigning World Pool champion jockeys, I doubt if you will get long odds on achieving another honour on her c.v.