Rain on the Parade
In an ideal world, it would rain every Thursday and the sun would shine every Saturday. A drum-beat rain – steady, soaking, settling, soothing. And a guitar-solo sun – just enough to keep the rhythm.
Sean Clancy
Going Racing
I wonder about the disconnect, the distance often. I wonder how it happened, why it happened. I’ve spent my life in both, actually it doesn’t feel like both, it’s one for me. Racing. Not flat racing or jump racing – just racing.
‘Small, sweet and bouncy’
There is nothing like calling a hard-working steeplechase trainer after a Saturday winner.
Kingsley’s home cooking
There have been countless studies on home-field advantage in sports. Harvard University examined it. Sports Illustrated, ESPN.com, SB Nation have written numerous articles on it. Professor Tobias J. Moskovitz and L. Jon Wertheim compiled home-field stats in sports from soccer to cricket in their book, Scorecasting: The Hidden Influences Behind How Sports are Played and Games are Won.
Time will Tell
And so it begins. The travel season. Up early this morning for a trip to Monkton to see some jumpers and flat horses train. Then to Aiken. Then to Camden. Then home. The Orange County Point-to-Point Sunday, hopefully, a showing of Two Gentlemen of Verona at the Hill School Theatre in between. At least, that’s what Miles expects. It is simply that time of year, when horses disperse and weekends are overbooked. I like it.
Mr. Lickety makes it work again at Aiken
Traditions.
Over the years, the Aiken Steeplechase has created trends, which have turned into traditions. Decades ago, Hall of Famer Burley Cocks would come out swinging, winning everything with his oat-devouring, muscle-bound bluebloods from the engine rooms of Valentine, Mellon, Murdoch and other luminaries. You could set your clock to it.
Postcards from Cheltenham
Another one in the books. The Cheltenham Festival has come and gone, leaving memories and mementos. From the Mullins/Walsh four timer Thursdsay to Jessica Harrington’s three winners including Sizing John’s Cheltenham Gold Cup to Gordon Elliott’s official coming of age to the women’s sweep of the amateur races, this year’s Festival had it all. TIHR’s Sean Clancy penned a few postcards from Cheltenham.
Worlds Apart
What a difference a week makes. Cheltenham Festival. Piedmont Point-to-Point. Although, looking at the overnight for our local meet, field sizes are comparable – 17, 14, 20, 19…the times have changed, the world has changed but still the interest in country sport continues. Long may it continue. Miles and I share the Saturday couch. The Dubai … Read more
Goodbye Cheltenham
Homeward bound. Four days have come and gone. Defining moments. Lifetime memories. Seems like a long time ago when Mullins and Walsh were on the floor. They rallied. Sizing John rallied, closing an open Gold Cup. Cue Card crashing out again, again at the same fence. Douvan has a broken pelvis. That explains that. Horses, … Read more
Cheltenham Day 4: Nichols Canyon books ticket to Iroquois
Ruby Walsh tilts his head. Smiles, squints, smirks. And whispers words. They slide out of the side of his mouth, like dice into a corner of a craps table. Not many, but pertinent, pointed words, water to the parched. He’s done this his whole career, after wins and losses, to his father, Ted, to Paul Nicholls and so, so many to Willie Mullins. The words are secrets to us – the fans, the punters – and doled out to the insiders, the ones standing in the winner’s enclosure, gleeful, or the unsaddling enclosure, glum. Yesterday, he doled out four to me. Yes, four words, in the heat of Cheltenham, between saluting the crowd, weighing in and holding the trophy.
