Note from Bob:

To avoid any confusion this article is written by SPY not me 🙂 … just so my current partner doesn’t worry I was up no good at Newbury last weekend!

REFLECTIONS ON THE HENNESSY

So here we are again – on the verge of another weekend. For the life of me I can’t believe it has been nearly seven days since the last one. It feels as if I am coming to after a massive bender that has left part of my life unaccounted for. But that cannot be right as I am not handcuffed to a lamppost in an ill-fitting dress. The remnants of last week and the majority of this one are gone; I shall have to face facts – precious time has once again slipped away.

This Saturday it is the turn of Sandown, just as last week it was Newbury. I know that because I was there. It is my local racecourse and going to the Hennessy seemed like a good idea at the time, if only to escape thoughts of Christmas shopping.

Of course I should have known no good would come of it. Going to the races is a bit like getting married – more expensive than you bargained for and easier to enter than it is to exit. All those traffic marshals that are so helpful at lunchtime seem to vanish after the last race.

Perhaps because I go racing less now, and increasingly those attending Saturday meetings tend to be day-trippers, I did not bump into anyone I knew – not unless you count Joan Collins or Princess Anne, neither of whom seemed to recognise me for some reason.

But I did run into Freda. Now the last time I saw Freda I was in faded denim and carried a twelve-string guitar. She used to wear those thigh boots that were so popular in the mid-seventies and are only worn these days by models on the covers of inaccessible magazines in newsagents’ shops.

Such garb would be outlawed by the present Newbury executive, who is enforcing a new dress code in the premier enclosure. Men are required to wear collared shirts; women modest-length skirts. Thankfully neither Freda nor I were tempted to turn back the fashion clock.

One lady did fall foul of the new decree. According to her account, dressed in: “a very, very expensive navy leather coat, a navy felt fedora, a Barbour shoulder bag and Dubarry boots,” it was the accompanying designer denim jeans that prevented her entry into the premier stand.

Although cutting a dash, forensic scientist Ms Helene Mardon-Webb came up with the wrong concoction on this occasion as far as Newbury’s fashion police were concerned.

Self-described as being in her seventh decade, Ms Mardon-Webb, who claimed to be unaware of the racecourse’s sartorial shift and is “from outside the area”, declared her outfit to have been successfully test-driven in the enclosures at Cheltenham and Ascot.

Apparently the men in yellow fluorescent jackets consigned her to what was for her a less congenial afternoon’s racing in the grandstand enclosure, where fish and chips or a squelchy pie and a pint replaced oysters in the champagne bar.

Although supportive of a dress code at the races (feeling those that turn up in the better enclosures in jeans and tracksuits are akin to those wishing to join a club without paying its membership), some common sense needs to prevail.

Just as rigid security at airports is not designed to ensnare the vicar and his wife, a dress code needs to be open to interpretation based on the individual. In this instance it is a shame if a visitor to the Racecourse Newbury, that had no wish to rail against or flout guidelines she was unaware of, had an experience that fell short of her expectations.

To return to Freda – she and I used to have a sort of thing for one another. She was always with someone (a man usually) and he was always much more attractive and upwardly mobile (whatever that means) than I. There was a lawyer and a young music producer pestering for her attentions, yet for some reason she saw something in me.

Her lovers came and went but I was the focus of her attention whenever we met. Perhaps it was because I considered her to be out of my league and as a result was always incredibly casual in my dealings with her – possibly giving her the false impression I was ultra-cool.

What is it they say about being at our most effective when we try the least hard? We even spent a few intimate nights together; but I am not sure it meant very much. Back then people used to do that sort of thing to save themselves the bother of having to go home.

So with the addition of a discreet grey hair or two, minus the thigh boots, but still with those swirling green eyes that could open a can of sardines, she fixed me with a stare, and after the usual exchange of scant news, suggested we met up one evening.

In part it felt more like a summons. Although with a girlfriend on this occasion, it transpired she was living with a man somewhere in East Hampshire. I knew she would be with someone or another because, although, like me she never married, unlike me, she was always attached.

Now for some reason I cannot fathom, I responded by saying I didn’t think her proposal of a furtive meeting was a good idea. That was a strange response from a man that, particularly after hearing Arlo Guthrie, Warren Zevon or Tom Rush on the radio, had tried unsuccessfully to track this woman down on more than one occasion during the last thirty or so years.

Yet, there I was, on the steps of Newbury grandstand, adopting some holier-than-thou attitude, denying us our Brief Encounter moment. Needless to say my reply did not go down well. After all, the offer was only for a drink. When I turned to speak she was gone. I suppose it will be another thirty years and more grey hairs before we meet again, if ever.

More dubious decisions followed. I backed Gassin Golf in the handicap hurdle. Having obtained 20/1 and witnessed his odds halve, I should have availed myself of a free bet at 6’s by laying the horse back at 14’s. But of course from a draughty grandstand that is easier said than done. Therefore, I watched him creep through the pack promisingly (he probably touched 4/1 for a few moments in running) before he faded on the run to the last to finish fifth.

To my mind the Hennessy reinforced the view that big yards invariably dominate the big races. I make this point because a very well known gambler once attempted to recruit me into his organisation if I would analyse horses that contested 0-75 handicaps on the Flat.

His reasoning was that as such runners were always seen as less attractive propositions by the bookmakers, they would invariably be incorrectly priced, particularly on big race days when the attention of odds-compilers was diverted.

There is something in such an argument, but in my experience you get what you pay for and trying to second-guess moderate horses is a thankless task and one that will only result in abject disappointment and disillusionment. All in all then, another demonstration of a possible lost opportunity – in part the story of my life!

Prior to the Hennessy, with an open mind I tried unsuccessfully to look beyond Rocky Creek. Although I felt he had a few pounds too many to shoulder I ended up backing him. It was a fair enough shout on a day that quickly lost its warmth as the sun dipped. Even so I came away from the race with two potential positives.

One was that, after tanking for much of the way and appearing to blow-up three-out, Invictus looks sure to win a decent handicap before the season ends. Regrettably, after subsequent mid-week news that the horse has suffered a recurrence of his injury, that will not now happen.

My other possible snippet for the future is that Merry King may be better over even further than 3m 2f and could be of interest in something like the Welsh National – or, who knows, even the big one itself at Aintree in March.

It’s always nice to leave a race meeting with something to look forward to even when you have little to look back on.

Still I managed to watch every race rather than spend my time visiting the lavatory. For those of you that are too young to understand why a grown man should consider this a little victory on a chilly day, all I can say is it will become clear soon enough. It seems plotting your movements in tandem with your bladder are just one of the joys that greets advancing years. That and making dodgy decisions…

PLAYING THE PERCENTAGES

Having watched the second instalment of a documentary about Morecombe and Wise last night, I was struck how adept they were at adjusting to trends.

Anyone that survives in any kind of business for a length of time has to be able to move with the flow. Eric and Ernie managed that pretty well, ensuring longevity in an otherwise short-lived profession.

They correctly identified the need for change, but not change for its own sake, merely in order to avoid burn-out and to appear fresh and relevant despite the fact they were treading well-worn boards. What they were clever at was re-inventing the M&W brand without compromising their ideals.

Flexibility is important. Racing, or more specifically betting, is a movable feast. That is to say what is laid out on the table alters.

There is no such thing as a blueprint for success in betting, only an approximation of how to approach its problematical composure.

Most races are like traps set by masters of the perverse. In common with other pursuits, the only recommendation is for would-be punters to spend as much time as possible researching their art: in this case horses and the races they contest. (Sometimes concentrating on the right race is as important as the horses.)

To a degree you can never do enough work, but because you are not sitting a specialised hypothetical exam and the checklist and work schedule is potentially endless, any effective short cut is welcome.

In order to find a possible bet you first have to look at every race before you and start short listing and eliminating. That takes time. Sure, some races only require a cursory look before they can be safely discarded. But even then you can overlook a horse or a clue that is a potential game-changer; hence the often heard cry from professionals that there is simply too much racing.

Now I know this seems like a plaintive cry in the wilderness to those with proper jobs that pick the game up and down at will. After all, how can there be too much of a good thing? They will argue you can always by-pass races or meetings of limited interest. On the face of it this seems reasonable. The problem is, after a while of blanking a major part of the race program, unfamiliarity will catch up with you.

The professional will start to lose his awareness and consequentially his edge. Much of this edge comes from the amount of information and data a professional (or someone constantly exposed to the business) stores in his head.

If he had to look up every piece of form, every horse, every jockey and trainer involved, his work rate would slow to such a degree that he would quickly become ineffectual, going through the motions rather than reaching meaningful conclusions. I have often found myself in this position, where endless races become an indistinct mist of print that could just as well be random pages from Tolstoy’s tome, War And Peace.

I have even overlooked horses I had noted as being of interest next time, even though I have scanned the race they are due to run in. The name has floated before my eyes, unregistered in a brain stuck in neutral, only becoming significant when someone mentions it is a market-mover the next day, or I actually clock it in running.

Maybe I am getting too old. Or maybe, as M&W did, I need to review the way I work. Swinging the percentages in your favour has always been my mantra.

I believe that, to be successful, this applies to any business. Without creating an edge for yourself you end up being just another punter, funding those that know more or are better players than you are. Business is invariably cut throat.

I used to believe the way forward was to become a walking racing encyclopaedia. I was aware of all the relevant form lines. Even when using a formbook, I instantly knew where to look to obtain collateral form. These days I have taken my eye from the ball too often to the extent I feel in danger of overlooking salient factors. The less you keep abreast of any business, the more it begins to slip through your fingers. Sometimes all it takes to give yourself that all-important edge is a scrap of information.

Take Cue Card, whose next intended run is in the King George VI Chase at Kempton. You know Cue Card, the horse that made a fool of so many of us (excepting stalwart fan Alice Plunkett) at Haydock. He would not stay we asserted; not good enough in any event. Wrong on both counts. Alice’s blind faith, although poorly thought out (liking a horse and having a picture of him on your wall does not count) was rewarded. (Is that a serpent you hear hissing with derision on my shoulder?)

So now we know Cue Card stays. Also that in the Betfair Chase he beat the best chasers assembled in any one place seen so far this season. That means he must have every chance of consolidating that success at Kempton on Boxing Day.

Yes, and no… Random factor aside, there is one important piece in the Cue Card jigsaw that might go overlooked, particularly if those evaluating his claim to the big Christmas chase are still suffering from the affects of the previous day’s alcohol intake.

Cue Card has had seventeen races over hurdles and chases. All of them bar one were on left-handed courses. On the one occasion he was asked to race right-handed, he ran poorly. The one occasion? In last year’s King George at Kempton Park – this of course being a right-handed track.

To the intelligence operative, this promises to be a breakthrough piece of information. They have a saying in Intelligence: If it looks like a fish and smells like a fish – it probably is a fish.

Right now, with only assumption to draw on, I am inclined to believe Cue Card may be a fish. Whether he turns out to be one or not is to an extent immaterial; what matters is we have established the often overlooked component that can turn victory into defeat.

As a fish, we know his possible vulnerability before he swims upstream toward the waiting bear on the bank rather than afterwards. Armed with this information, those caring to back Cue Card do so with their eyes wide open.

They may be able to successfully address the possible drawback, securing a guarantee from the Tizzards (or someone close by) that it is purely coincidental that Cue Card’s form thus far has been restricted to left-handed tracks, and that his bad run last year at Kempton had nothing to do with the configuration of the course. In which case, they will possibly obtain a better price than they should receive as sceptical bookmakers (my point will not be lost on them) will factor this doubt in to their odds. As it stands, the above scenario (pro or con) is an ideal example of obtaining an edge.

I used to survive and flourish by looking for such perceived advantages. Dissecting racecards and being able to decipher the secret signals is an imperative tool for a form analyst. And being able to work round the complex nature of a race is vital. No two can ever claim to be the same – different pitfalls permanently exist ultimately forcing us to guess.

Recently I have been rethinking operational options. With so much betting variance available (betting in running, arbitrage in all its forms: betting and laying, backing every horse in the race to show a guaranteed profit, taking one price laying off at another), the market has shifted incredibly. You could argue the day of actually trying to pick winners is over.

What matters is being able to foresee market moves. To that end, many players do just that these days – concentrating all their efforts into merely playing. They zigzag their way through race after race. In effect they are the ones truly playing the percentage game.

Aided by various computer programs – sometimes known as robots – they may only attain minimal profit on each race, but revenues accrue until, added up at the end of trading, a healthy profit is returned. Those of us waiting for the perfect bet are left watching while the ship sails. But playing on a large number of races each day is not without considerable risk and requires a strong mindset and budget.

The percentage game is the one all businesses play to some extent. Assuming we adopt sound judgement to such speculation, the greater the number of punts we take, the higher our chances of overall success becomes.

This may sound strange, but look at the blue chip companies. The film industry basically adopts a scatter gun approach, confident that, say, out of every hundred films, ten will bomb; forty will show a small profit and forty a small loss. Those aren’t the films that concern them. The films that concern them – those that float their businesses – are the remaining ten percent that make the brilliant Gravity-style profits.

They are the films that finance the Ferraris and allow their shareholders to take long lunches along Hollywood Boulevard. But, although it might seem obvious in retrospect, attempting to identify the blockbusters from the turkeys when they are in the can is tricky.

By chucking all their options into one bin, film studios can sit back and let the winners and losers sort themselves out. One Gravity is all it takes to finance all the duds. Everything else takes care of itself. The same applies in the publishing and music business as well as the money markets.

When the auditing is finished, the bottom line percentage profit on turnover may seem small – perhaps no more than 10 percent on a normal year – a whopping 25 percent if you are Warner Bros and produced and distributed Gravity – meaning, converted to odds familiar to us, they are betting to odds of 1/10.

That figure puts most of us off. However you shake it, those are the kind of odds we shun. But there is a difference between striking an individual wager at such long odds-on and having a virtual guarantee of that figure being returned over a succession of transactions.

A turnover of £500,000 a year to make £50,000 doesn’t seem so bad when expressed in those terms. And of course there is always the chance of uncovering the golden calf.

Maybe letting the racing channels roll and placing one hand on the computer mouse is the way to go for those that fancy their chances. Rewards are high but dangers are manifold. Before contemplating such a course of action, dummy runs are required and even then you need to take into account what works in theory does not always work in practice. We can all talk a good fight!

However, as with Eric and Ernie when confronted with television as opposed to music hall and then with the emergence of satire, punters in this age find themselves in a new world.

Ten years on, the advent of Betfair, off-shore betting and of bookmakers apparently chopping off limbs to encourage us to bet, mean punters are no longer in the cold. Opportunities exist to play and lay at will. In some cases markets are formed twenty hours before the advertised time of even maiden events. The genie-in-the-lamp is no longer solely answerable to bookmakers; what used to be the province of their trading departments is now in the public domain.

The world continues to turn. It may seem to have tilted on its axis; in truth it has always been thus: a new generation needs to adapt to the possibilities.

ONLY MONEY…

So here we go again, racing looks all set to shoot itself in the foot.

Jockey Club Racecourses are looking for a single sponsor for what they perceive as the three big chases of the season: The Betfair Chase, scheduled for Haydock this Saturday, the William Hill King George VI Chase at Kempton on Boxing Day, and the Betfred Cheltenham Gold Cup itself at the Festival in March.

Jockey Club Racecourses seem to have this slightly wonky idea that they can market the two preceding events as part of the route on the ‘road map’ to Cheltenham and chasing’s jewel in the crown. A light bulb seems to have flashed in someone’s head here. Doh! Had a great idea; let’s get a non-racing sponsor for our major jumping events. Let’s kick those bookmakers where it hurts – show them who is boss around here.

Oh dear! Or as Jeremy Paxman would say – yeees!  There are several issues Jockey Club Racecourses seem to have overlooked.

Firstly, racing is not the attractive pursuit to those that operate outside its confines that it is to those earning a living from within. Try applying for a position with a blue chip company and listing horseracing as one of your interests and see what reception you get.

Most people beyond the earshot of a grandstand tannoy, view racing as a somewhat grubby and corrupt pursuit; one where jockeys habitually stop and start horses at will, and a group of people (presumably affiliated to the Cosa Nostra) know most, if not all, the results in advance.

And even if they find racing vaguely interesting or exciting, it involves gambling, and therefore anyone interested in racing is likely to be more attracted to that seamy aspect of the sport rather than the sport itself. And employers don’t wish to employ people that are liable to be placing bets and then monitoring the progress of their wagers on company time.

That aside, racing, particularly jump racing, is a precarious sport for participants and followers alike. No one wants to sponsor a race and then incur the wrath of the teddy bear and sugar-plum brigade, especially if they form part of their potential market.

‘One-time Gold Cup Hero Dies In Horrific Toys ISUZ Chase Fall’ is not exactly good publicity. Okay, that is worse case scenario, but, let’s not kid ourselves, it happens.

Less dramatic, but more likely, is the possibility of a sponsor gearing itself and its advertising machine up to a major jumping event that is called off.

Such a possibility exists this Saturday as the Betfair Chase at Haydock is possibly no better than levels-you-devils to go ahead. That is if foreseen Arctic conditions materialise. And, already, with the thermometer plunging toward the red, that seems very likely. A couple of similar occasions can make a sponsor edgy. All that bubbly put literally on ice is not good business.

So the Jockey Club Racecourses dream of bypassing bookmakers – the one group within the industry that does actually understand the mechanics of the business – whilst beckoning to outsiders in a major and expensive one-off deal – seems to contain more smoke and mirrors than substance.

It is not my business to defend bookmakers. It is my contention that they have had too much say in the way racing is run for too long. The tail has wagged the dog for so long it is impossible to distinguish one from the other.

Bookmakers’ constant meddling with the fixture list, their insistence of racing virtually 24/7 – 363 days a year to the extent we now even face racing on Good Friday – should have been tempered long ago.

As should their assertion that increased turnover equals increased profits to racing. All bookmakers and gamblers know this to be a barefaced lie: decreased turnover (meaning punters have already done in their cash) is what signals increased profit.

What bookmakers have always strived to instigate is extra fixtures and more handicaps to bewilder those that spend their social security payments in their offices.

That is before the bursting of the bubble means their customers take a detour to the pub or off-licence. Theirs is, and always has been, a policy of bamboozling the punter with the sheer weight of racing on a Saturday (under most circumstances the day by which bookmakers’ accounting figures stand or fall) and of never breaking the habit of continual betting: that is to say, from one race to another, one day to another, one week, one month, and so on … The damage they have inflicted on racing was done a long time hence, and is unlikely to ever be reversed without a Tote monopoly.

We know the bookmakers for the crocodiles beneath the murky waters that they are. To be fair to them they are no worse than the energy suppliers or the rail companies – possibly better in some respects as at least we are not compelled to employ their services.

But all big companies have one driving force in common: that is the need to make money. They are never content to take a drop in profit. Increased profit is a given – it is sacrosanct. Forget wars, petulance, a sliding economy; their bellies need the constant replenishment only the green dollar or the crinkly purple twenty can supply. They possess insatiable appetites.

We know this. If we didn’t know it before the turn of the century, we do now.

But Jockey Club Racecourses have picked the wrong time and place for a battle with the old enemy. If there is one thing bookmakers are good for it is sponsorship.

They don’t much care for the semantics of it. A Derby, a Group 1, a Grade 1; hurdles, chases, the Flat, it is all the same to the grey men in the counting houses.

If the public wish to treasure the gold standard these races provide, bookmakers will chuck a few quid at races like the Eclipse, the Supreme Novices’ or the King George and Queen Elizabeth so long as they can trade with impunity on the first at Lucky Meadows and the last at Wolverhampton. Don’t look too deeply at their motives; just be grateful they pump cash into the system.

Jockey Club Racecourses’s comments that they would like a single sponsor for the pot of gold that is the Gold Cup and the two big chases that lead to it (what about the Charlie Hall, the Hennessy or the Aon; don’t they constitute major trails?) and that they would prefer it should this sponsor not be a bookmaker, is tantamount to requesting blood donors only have silver spoons in their mouths.

Racing is an insular industry. Bookmakers and punters are fully familiar with its rules – outsiders less so.

Outsiders will soon tire of what they will quickly perceive as racing’s irrationality.

They will fail to understand why two inspections have to be called before midday to determine racing can go ahead and then find, much to their chagrin when they arrive at the track, that it is sprinkled with a covering of frost straight from a Christmas card, and that their journey has indeed been wasted. Leaves on the line halting the 8.20 to Paddington ain’t nothing!

They will tire of the fact that a race can be delayed because the racecourse doctor is no longer present, or a horse is running loose. They will fail to understand why a stewards’ inquiry takes twenty minutes to ratify a race that has already been run. They will wonder why is should be necessary to fine the winning jockey; also that such an act can and often does attract more publicity than the race itself.

Bookmakers and punters take all the above and more in stride – just another day at the office!

So Jockey Club Racecourses have rubbed bookmakers the wrong way over the wrong issue. Already an offended William Hill is hinting at taking its business elsewhere.

Their public relations representative, Kate Miller, sounding as if she had smoked a hundred cigarettes the night before (she may not smoke, she just has a husky sexy voice that provokes speculation), expounded the company line by warning William Hill may be reviewing its sponsorship commitment. That is jargon for: we have a loaded gun and we are prepared to use it.

At Cheltenham on Sunday, she sounded genuinely aggrieved at the suggestion her firm should stand aside from its Kempton deal with the King George in order to be replaced by a top-tier sponsor.

Whilst conceding it would be beneficial for racing to attract sponsors from outside racing, thus potentially attracting wider audiences, she described the attitude shown toward bookmakers by Jockey Club Racecourses as disappointing.

That’s one way of putting it Kate. Downright bonkers is another! Even if Jockey Club Racecourses strike it lucky and lure a sponsor down the road to Cheltenham, keeping them may prove another matter.

Big firms are courted internationally. Competition is intense. It is fanciful to assume a major global company would wish to spend the kind of money needed to bolster the three events earmarked by Jockey Club Racecourses in order for its clients to shiver in a field in the depths of winter.

When it comes to sponsorship, bookmakers turn into racing’s friend, but even they do not have limitless pockets. The big layers do all have a flagship race. They are not Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, adopting a principal.

Jockey Club Racecourses’s Road To Cheltenham may be constructed of yellow brick as far as they are concerned; in the real world its compound is somewhat more down-to-earth.

THE END…

So that is the end of another Flat racing season then… This time around there was no Frankel.

The season started with grim news surrounding Godolphin, an organisation that continues to underperform considering the huge amount of money it invests in bloodstock – much of it seemingly unwisely.

Although they ended the season on a brighter note than they started it, Godolphin still has a way to go if it is to achieve the major global targets set.

Observing from afar, it appears Godolphin has accrued too many highly-paid chiefs and not enough Indians. The policy of boycotting British trainers and insisting it is a Dubai-run organisation may be all well and good, but there is no denying such a policy has resulted in a strangulation of prize-money won.

At the other end of the spectrum there were success stories for the Hannons Richard, and for the solid Ballydoyle operation overseen by Aidan O’Brien, who will start next year with an untold spectre of riches.

Declaration Of War, Magician and Kingsbarns represent the older division, and all three look likely to snap up high-profile races next year.

Richard Hughes and Ryan Moore can look back on 2013 with satisfaction, as can Johnny Murtagh, a man apparently possessing a Midas touch in both the riding and training sphere. For once the juvenile crop, spearheaded by Toormore, War Command, Australia and Kingston Hill look exciting.

You can go off some horses. Not all of them are like those charming ponies that canter across young girls’ bedroom walls.

Nor could they fill the hooves of the Herculean character that was Boxer in George Orwell’s Animal Farm. He was the workhorse that tirelessly hoisted the farm on his broad shoulders when it was faced with ruination. This before, exhausted and burnt out, he unwittingly aiding his own demise. In his determination to aid the greater cause, complying with the wishes of the pigs in charge, he willingly presented himself on his final journey to the establishment known as the abattoir.

I am not expecting, or requiring such a drastic one-sided relationship from racehorses that I might temporarily support, but just lately I get the feeling one or two are taking me for something of a fool.

As an example there is the case of Penina, a filly running in the nursery at Doncaster last Saturday from a mark of 66. Constructing a case for her was not that difficult after a recent fourth in a similar race at York.

From a low-profile but normally reasonably successful yard, punters seemed to agree with me as she was an overnight market-mover, touching as low as 4/1 in the morning. Penina finished twelfth of twelve, beaten a total of twenty-eight lengths. For a third-favourite in a six furlong event, that takes a bit of doing.

Most horses (although not necessarily as obliging as Boxer) are willing subjects that by and large will do their best. However, as far as punters are concerned, there is a drawback.

That is, as you have doubtless noticed, horses can’t speak. Therefore we have to second-guess what they will do the whole time. Because they cannot be asked, we have to guess whether the trip/ground is right; whether a left-handed/right-handed track suits; whether they have a headache; in short, if all is well within their world.

In fact, betting on racehorses requires a great leap of faith and a good deal of guesswork. Unable to eliminate guesswork completely, all we as analysts can hope to do is remove as much of it as possible. We accept that, but at times it seems as if, like the husband that doesn’t recognise his wife is cheating on him, we are the last to know.

Look at Favourite Treat on Saturday. I thought he had a good chance – something that was reflected in the betting. He was no good thing; but, with recent form on a soft surface and a progressive profile, he was entitled to run a race of sorts.

All of a sudden, around mid-morning, almost doubling in price, it seemed common knowledge that a telescope would be required to spot what sort of race he would run.

Bookmakers could not give Favourite Treat away. This was explained by halfway as Favourite Treat (hardly living up to his name for his supporters) began to lose ground. He became systematically passed by horse after horse until settling like a stone on an ocean bed for nineteenth place out of a field of twenty – beaten in excess of fifty-two lengths.

Now, I appreciate that in a field of twenty there will be nineteen tales of disappointment and misfortune. However, it strikes me no half-fancied horse should be beaten as far as fifty-plus lengths in a seven furlong handicap without a resoundingly good reason. As far as I know none has been forwarded for Favourite Treat.

Perhaps the horse could enlighten us, perhaps he had a word with his stablemates who then laid him on the carrot exchanges (hence the market drift) telling them he would rather stick his snout in a bucket of treacle than run in the Betfred Fun And Friendly Handicap. Perhaps he had a word in Fred’s ear. Whatever mitigating circumstances may or may not exist, Favourite Treat was neither fun nor friendly on Saturday.

Losers are all part of this business. Backing winners means an acceptance of backing losers. But there are losers and then there are horses that are just ‘no good’. And it is alarming when the market is able to predict a poor run from a fancied contender. Something has to be wrong in the cases when that is what it does.

There was worse to come for favourite backers when Rhombus, the 13/2 market-leader in the November Handicap, was never seen with a chance, trailing in a dismal eighteenth of twenty-three, beaten over fifty lengths.

Ground or no ground that is a staggering distance for a fancied horse to be beaten in a Flat race (Forgotten Hero was five lengths further back in nineteenth – Lahaag was over a hundred lengths behind the winner in twenty-first position).

I know it was late in the season and horses can topple over the edge. But, if that is the case, should trainers not take some responsibility? By definition a trainer is supposed to do just that – the clue is in the title.

FOUR THOUSAND AND ALL THAT…

The cynical might say it is only a number. Four thousand: three thousand, what’s the difference? Frankly for a National Hunt jockey, either figure is phenomenal. Considering he has already smashed six previous riding records, some might say he has little left to prove.

First to go was the record of National Hunt winners for a season (253), followed by the fastest 100-winners (admittedly assisted by an enhanced fixture list). Next to succumb to the McCoy magic was the long-held record established by Sir Gordon Richards in 1947 of the highest number of winners in any one season. McCoy scuttled Richards’ record by a greedy twenty when registering 289 winners in 2002.

Next for the torpedo was Richard Dunwoody’s tally when McCoy became the winning-most jump jockey of all time. Then, not content with beating previous records, he set about singularly busting down the doors leading to his own. He became the first jump jockey to ride 2,500 winners back in 2006 then rode his 3,000th winner in February 2009.

Already in a class of his own as far as targets were concerned, McCoy set about winning everything from selling hurdles to the Grand National, the Gold Cup and Champion Hurdle. Focusing on race-riding to the point of it being an obsession, Tony McCoy, who has now been champion jockey for eighteen consecutive seasons (another record), is a winner-riding machine. If not physically then certainly mentally constructed for the competitiveness of horseracing, there was only ever one purpose in the mind of Tony McCoy.

At thirty-nine years of age, he is getting on for a jump jockey. However, considering his achievements, you could still be forgiven for thinking he is older. Maybe he is; maybe he is on his second or third incarnation. Maybe in an earlier form he learned his trade from a chariot’s platform in Greece’s Hippodrome or in the Roman Circus. With weight not an issue in those former days, his face would not have had that gaunt pinched just-sucked-something sharp look it has now.

Tony McCoy is not everyone’s cup of lemon tea, although most punters love him, except perhaps those that bet against him and then have to witness an in-flight McCoy in a driving finish. True, Ruby is the scalpel to McCoy’s knife; both may be of equal ability, it is just that McCoy gives the impression of going to bed at night with a racecourse commentary running through his brain, whilst adrenalin replaces blood.

Out of the saddle, he can appear sullen, detached and haunted by his own sport and the pressures he heaps upon himself. In the saddle, ruthless in a finish, he can pick a horse up from the floor and lunge late to snatch a prize that rightfully belongs to someone else.

Time and again we have seen it (Synchronised in the 2012 Cheltenham Gold Cup); but McCoy is also a master out in the country, often nursing tentative jumpers over fences whilst they gather confidence, before the galvanised assault down the straight.

When McCoy is in the saddle anything is possible. That is what punters love – the money is never done-in until the race is complete. Preoccupied by an unquenchable thirst for winners – forget the great Good Friday shall-we-shan’t-we race debate – McCoy would ride for expenses at Hexham on Christmas Day. Some might label him mad – a one-dimensional one-trick pony only capable of functioning in the long shadows of winter beneath an iron sky: a man that needs the challenge presented by eight flights or twelve fences.

What he got at Towcester a little after 3pm on Thursday November 7th was two miles and five furlongs aboard hurdling debutant Mountain Tunes – the horse widely expected to supply a landmark four-thousandth success.

Racing is no respecter of convention or celebration. If it can sabotage the longed-for or the expected, rip up the script or rain on a parade, it will. It tried its hardest here but failed.

McCoy proved bigger than the scythe-carrying horseman. Wearing JP McManus’s waspish silks, McCoy, in front of his mentor and principal owner, his family, and urged on by well-wishers throughout the land, rode one of his most inspired finishes – one worthy of the occasion.

Only fifth turning for home, it seemed as if all the expectation was about to become thwarted. For this was meant to be the golden day – a private one for those within the circle. As with all horse races, the pre-show prices became irrelevant in running. All those with itchy fingers on their waiting machines could see was the lay button.

Pushed along, then clumsy at the second-last, Mountain Tunes was third and apparently labouring. Surely the dream would have to wait – it would be a humble affair at Southwell, or an event when our backs were partially turned. But wait … McCoy at his most determined … a horse in on the act, digging deep into its own box of tricks and conjuring a dash of magic dust. A tired leader; one more push from the last; a near collision with Panama Petrus in mid-air then a second wind; reserves from the depths – enough to pass the spoiler’s last chance, Kris Spin, and what was 3,999 is now 4,000.

Tony McCoy passes another milestone. The face – a mask of stone – cracks ever so slightly as it dawns. McCoy has cheated the gods yet again. The crowd erupts, the jockey responds to the claps on the back, the excitement from the stands. For a moment he is mortal in victory. It is only a brief moment. Already he is explaining that last flight collision with Aidan Coleman, steadying his mount, preparing for the ride back.

We can only watch and admire. Who is mad now? Not the man with the black-and-white sports gloves (I have an identical pair, there the similarity with the great man ends); no, not the man so-often decried for whatever reason – as victims of such elevated positions are – now so irrefutably, so incontrovertibly the master of all he surveys. This was the day all concerned will remember (paradoxically possibly McCoy least of all) long into the autumn of old-age.

Just one more day at the office for Tony McCoy: another record smashed (how many is it now?), another day’s work achieved, all this and Southwell tomorrow…

LOST IN TRANSLATION

It was quite a show on Sunday at Longchamp: Vive la France – or Long live France – literal translation: Up with France – loose translation: Up the British. Not much changes over the years; we remain uneasy allies with our Gaelic cousins across the Channel.

You could spot the French on Sunday: they were the ones in suits, some of whom were ever so slightly annoyed that the racing had interrupted a hearty lunch. Some were even more annoyed when locally-trained Catcall was adjudged to have come too soon in the Abbaye and Lesstalk In Paris was reckoned to have come much too soon in the Marcel Boussac, when attempting to make all. It seems coming too soon is perceived as a misdemeanour that justifies the return of the guillotine in France.

You could spot the British: they were the underdressed ones drinking beer on the lawn.

You could also spot the Japanese: draped in national flags and bringing with them an infectious enthusiasm for Japanese-trained duo Orfevre – French for goldsmith – and Kizuna – Japanese for bond. The Japanese don’t just support their horses; rather, having made a monumental journey of about six thousand miles as Air Nippon flies, they live every stride their compatriots take. They really seem immersed in the game of horseracing. After several near misses, [El Condor Pasa, Deep Impact and Orfevre last year and again this], their turn surely awaits in a race that seems to mean so much to them.

Staging seven Group 1s on one afternoon could only occur in a country whose racing is operated nationally by a pari mutual [mutual betting] system where profits are ploughed directly back into racing.

This in stark contrast to this country where racing is seen as an industry and managed accordingly, churning cream for the fat-cats that are dependent on it to run their Bentleys.

Top of the list are of course the bookmakers who over the past twenty years have gradually gained virtual control of the way the business is run. This should not come as a surprise as bookmakers are business organisations first and foremost, driven by profit as opposed to leanings of the philanthropic variety.

They do generously contribute to racing’s purse by sponsoring the odd prestige event. Ladbrokes finance and promote the St Leger (not without demanding their pound of flesh) and Coral and Betfred do the same for the Eclipse and the Haydock Sprint. William Hill prefer to confine their support to gold-edged National Hunt events such as the King George VI Chase at Kempton and the Supreme Novices’ at Cheltenham – possibly reasoning there is a slight chance bad weather will let them off the hook once in a blue moon.

Of course bookmakers are in their elements when adding their names to events such as the Ayr Gold Cup or, as is the case this Saturday at York, the Coral Handicap and, at Newmarket, the Betfred Cesarewitch. One firm has circumnavigated all this with the This isn’t The [Stan James Champion Hurdle] Handicap at York on Friday over a mile.

Private companies will always put the interests of their own shareholders before those of the consumer.

Energy firms, rather than joining in the general Macaroon mantra of us ‘all being in this together’, prefer to forego reduced profit margins in favour of increasing prices to impoverished householders already paying over the odds for electricity and gas supplies.

Even the chocolate manufacturers are about to join in the scrum, increasing their prices just in time for Christmas on the premise that the price of cocoa has gone up. How seasonal, even though chocolate has been shrinking in quantity for years whilst the prices steadily rise…

Back to Sunday, and the non-private racing show that was Prix De l’arc de Triomphe day at Longchamp.

Actually it was a triumph as well as a Triomphe. And there were horses as well as people. In fact it became something of an equine Ladies’ Day.

Unbeaten three-year-old filly Treve – French for tactic – despite running black with sweat beforehand, was an emphatic Arc winner. Moonlight Cloud – means a cloud diffusing the rays of the moon, or moonlight cloud – set the place alight after her unbelievable last-to-first success in the Prix de la Foret.

Her win put me in mind of two other notable fillies [actually, Moonlight Cloud is mare] in Zarkava, whose Arc win was unforgettable and the equally brilliant American filly Zenyatta. Both had a habit of milking audiences, starting slowly and coming from seemingly impossible positions to win races of the highest calibre with consummate ease.

So this Saturday it is a case of follow that Newmarket! With the Dubai Challenge Stakes, the Cesarewitch, the Rockfel and the Autumn Stakes it promises to be a cracking card. Although some translation – or at least an explanation is required – to justify reasoning behind staging two Group 1 juvenile events separated by only thirty-five minutes and a furlong  [the Middle Park and the Dewhurst] on the same card.

Be Ready should not be underestimated in the Dewhurst – he looks a potential star for Godolphin – but will face the big battalions from Ballydoyle, so good luck with that one!

York offers handicap after handicap for those of that persuasion, and one of the first major National Hunt meetings of the year kicks off in Wales when Chepstow steps from behind  a flat curtain of mediocrity to stage top-class jumping action.

All this as the Pit And The Pendulum that is the weather threatens to sharpen its blade. Cold winds are on the way from Russia – a steppe too far perhaps for those that need new winter attire.

TIME’S ARROW

Heavy ground at Salisbury in October: it’s not right somehow. Salisbury is a summer track. Seeing the cathedral shivering and partly obscured by a mizzle looks like a climate-change warning. But there it is, what else can we expect now the precious last months of summer have slipped beneath the horizon?

Already this week has contained elements of the unexpected for your correspondent, who, to be frank, has little to correspond with you about. Unless you count an excursion to Basingstoke town centre on Monday, the washing machine packing up and the car battery giving out, which I am not sure we should. Why is it we never get a winner when we need it most?

Basingstoke may not be as quintessentially English as Salisbury; however, it has a better shopping centre and an excellent library – being the purpose of visit. It also has a Chinese restaurant that offers an all-you-can-eat lunchtime buffet for £6.90. I have always thought this a dangerous way to conduct business – about as inappropriate as the woman that throws open her dressing gown and dares a suitor to ‘Take me – do what you will with me daarling!’ It can be asking for trouble. As for me, I have to say I am more likely to wreak havoc at the buffet than in the boudoir these days, but unlike some of my fellow diners, I may have heaped two meals on my plate but did consume it all. Strangely, when it comes to wastage, it seems the overweight eaters are the worse culprits.

Suitably refuelled for the rest of the week, I finished the shopping and called into Ladbrokes on the way to the multi-storey. Not having an interest in the day’s racing (in truth I was not even too sure what was running – a brief look at the cards the night before told me all I needed to know), I don’t quite know why I even bothered – habit I suppose, something bookmakers rely on to keep the wheels of their businesses turning. I arrived at one of racing’s coalfaces in time to see some cardboard horses running at a virtual track. Some of those horses need looking at – they have terrible actions – I feel they run too often. Four horses went over the line together although none were particularly vigorously ridden, making me assume there was more than one non-trier involved in the finish.

There was also a race at Bath taking place. Richard Hughes was on the favourite and seemed a long way back when they turned for home. He conjured a run out of the horse and loomed large on the outside a furlong out, looking sure to win only to be run out of it close home. There was some muttering from the handful of punters in the shop. One took revenge on his ticket, ripping it to shreds, which was probably an expensive piece of vandalism. He then started to swear at the screen, directing his comments at Hughsie. I say started to swear because the word of choice started with an f…, but he retracted it as if suddenly reminded he was inside a monastery. It strikes me a suppressed swear word, indicating it is not part of the speaker’s normal vocabulary, carries more weight than the one that is spoken habitually. The man had clearly backed the Hughes-ridden favourite and felt aggrieved – but not so aggrieved that it stopped him scribbling a replacement selection on another slip.

My comrades-at-arms were not the sort you would invite to a dinner-party. There was what I took to be a lady (I can’t be sure though) sitting on a stool clutching a betting slip as if it were a doctor’s prescription. Her mobile went off and she jabbering into it without taking her eyes off the bank of screens. There was the obligatory machine-player, someone that had adopted the thing judging by his desperate desire to feed it. He was pressing buttons and holding symbols at lightning speed, seemingly knowing what he was doing, making me wonder whether he should put this knowledge to better use and pursue a career in IT.

There was someone fighting sleep in a corner as two would-be punters finalised selections for the next race from somewhere other than Bath.

There was what I took to be the manageress overseeing everything from her perch by what used to be a bandit screen. In my day, a betting office manager had to settle bets and spent most of his time doing just that – facing a mountain of slips with an ever-growing headache. These days I presume some machine made in China completes the task by day and sorts out the employee roster and wages by night.

If the sparse and motley collection of customers in Basingstoke is anything to go by, I doubt the volume of bets in betting offices comes close to what they once were. In many ways this is strange. Cluttered with technology, punters in today’s clinical shops – fitted-out like Vodafone units – expect to watch the action and can back and see events from all over the world; whereas, back in the day, they listened to commentaries from a crackly loudspeaker the size of an old Bush radio. Yet the betting offices of today seem to harbour customers that look as if they have mistaken the place for a soup kitchen. Surely this means something is wrong somewhere.

It would appear John McCririck is a man attempting to wind back the clock. Embittered by his dismissal from Channel 4 Racing, his court case against his former employers is in progress. John is unwisely taking on the big battalions in the hope of exposing ageism. Sorry if this is news John, but employers are not forming an orderly queue to take on seventy-three-year-old writers/presenters – or people of that age to do anything. In an attempt to make ends meet, I know of a reliable and fit sixty-year-old that could not get a job with a newsagent delivering the morning papers in our village. To quote Bruce Hornsby, that’s The Way It Is. Racing has served John well and vice versa, but sometimes you have to move on in life rather than remain in a time warp.

That said, Channel 4 has rather missed a trick with its racing coverage. I suppose it has updated its approach to the sport somewhat, but it still squanders a great deal of valuable air time, particularly when subjecting us to its presenters’ tips on the Morning Line – a program that seems to contain more guffaws and in-jokes than a gentleman’s club for displaced Tories.

Fifty minutes of scheduling on a Saturday morning could surely contain better content than a bunch of presenters looking as if they are still recovering from their previous evening’s exertions at the bar. A magazine-styled program aimed at racing fans that informs rather than second-guesses should replace endless selections from a team that belie their own tipping abilities.

With two exceptions they are presenters not tipsters. Shifting emphasis away from tipping would be preferable to confusing viewers with a raft of unlikely selections for the hardest handicaps of the day. The newspapers are full of those after all!

Channel Four get a chance to present some quality television this weekend as they cover the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.

Latest news from France means Leading Light will join what looks like a top class line-up on Sunday for the big event. There was rain in Paris on Monday and more is forecast on Friday, meaning Good to Soft ground is almost certainly the likely surface. Is France the wettest place on Earth?

Rain or no rain, France does stage horse racing rather well and at an affordable rate. The weekend cards at Longchamp are testament to that.

Of course, we know a thing or two about the sport – Royal Ascot being our showpiece meeting for the year. But then, as with Channel Four’s racing coverage, generally we dumb down rather than concentrate on the quality Group racing provides. Cue the old argument about there being too much racing and it being staged for the benefit of bookmakers.

Maybe it is time someone this side of the Channel realised the perceived stereotype of racing fans is not wholly correct.