- This topic has 358 replies, 53 voices, and was last updated 3 years, 7 months ago by
.
- Posts
What is a great racehorse? That is the question (again).
If a trainer had a good horse and yet never ran it in Grade / Group 1 races, always running against lesser quality opposition… it will probably run up a long sequence of victories. But you wouldn’t call the horse “a great” because the form shown is inferior to what a great horse is.
Exactly the same in Group / Grade 1 company. The quality of Group / Grade 1 races varies enormously. Many Grade 1 races are won by horses rated in the mid 160’s and that is over a stone less than what they’d regard “a great”. Form shown to win a sequence of group / grade 1’s in a poor year/s may not be “a great”.
ie If measuring greatness without ability / rating being the main contributor, then you are to a large extent rewarding a horse with greatness not for its own ability but the comparative mediocrity of its rivals.
Also: If greatness is measured without ability / rating being the main contributor… You’d get what I believe is a ridiculous event: Two horses running against each other, one “a great” and one not a great. Both horses run to their absolute best, and yet the “great” is beaten.
So for me – a horse needs to put up great quality performances to be “a great”.
However, many horses have great attributes and I see no reason why they can not be seen as “great” racehorses, without being “A GREAT”. eg Persian Punch and Dublin Flyer were for me great, without coming anywhere near the ability of greatness.
Value Is EverythingYeah, I agree about Alderbrook; and I remember a comment on the Morning Line about his soundness, or lack of; it was almost a miracle he even made it to the racecourse.
After his Champion Hurdle win, I’m sure his next runs were on the flat at Longchamps…..placed in a Gp 1 I think.
Us animals are always abused in these sort of threads.
I have read the beginning of the thread and a fair bit at the end so possibly have a slanted view but my hooved view is; that with the exception of holidays, and possibly conjugal relations, if you stretch things out they usually lose their lustre.
I am joining Pubwell on a stool with this – four days diluted the quality and the lustre of the festival. The Wednesday Derby was soooo exciting because you had to nick off work. People were hiding from cameras in case they were spotted. The workshy were all there – it was almost Brighton Rock.
As for Chelters – Extreme excitement on the first day – IT WAS THE FIRST DAY. Extreme excitement on the second middle day because of the memories of the first day and enjoying the MEAT OF THE SANDWICH. Maybe the Gold Cup has been tinkered with too much from the time of the Thinker when the heavens opened with the spectacle of snow, but it was a tense sort of excitement as you had just reached THE PINNACLE OF THE LAST DAY- the mountaineer knows it when he reaches the summit. It’s the best – pure elation. With the last breaths you see the truths of your life and hopefully you are calm with the vision.
On that note I shall now calm myself down with a herbal tea – it’s been bucketing down in Bankrokeciti and the barnet – what’s left of the golden locks Sky one described, is wet through from being out in it. Weather can be just as atmospheric as Cheltenham especially at the extremes. Smell comes into it too !
Can’t beat the smell of fresh horse poo!
I've stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains
I've walked and I crawled on six crooked highwaysIt’s tempting to suggest to gamble he’s not actually a racehorse or, at the very least, not a past Champion Hurdle winner, anyway.
But the nagging worry is he will then go on to successfully persuade me that he is.
I am "The Horse Racing Punter" on Facebook
https://mobile.twitter.com/Ian_Davies_
https://www.facebook.com/ThePointtoPointNHandFlatracingpunter/
It's the "Millwall FC" of Point broadcasts: "No One Likes Us - We Don't Care"Here are Monksfield’s met appointments for the three seasons when he was at his peak. I’ve worked out I saw him in the flesh four times, his famous dead heat with Night Nurse in the 1977 Templegate, his runner up finish to Sea Pigeon in the same race in 1980, and his admirable runner up finishes to Royal Gaye and Beacon Light in the 1978 and 1979 runnings of the Royal Doulton. Sea Pigeon also had a crazy mad schedule book but I think this one matches anything for insanity. So much more entertaining than a season of laid on the plate, small field Graded non handicaps.
1976/77
October 16 Curragh unplaced in a 29 runner flat handicap
October 20 Punchestown 3rd of nine in a handicap hurdle carrying 11 – 3
October 30 Curragh unplaced in a 23 runner flat handicap
November Naas unplaced in a 26 runner flat handicap
November 20 Navan 3rd of 14 in a handicap hurdle carrying 11 – 5
November 27 Naas unplaced in a handicap hurdle
December 4 Fairyhouse won a 16 runner handicap hurdle carrying 11-4
December 28 Leopardstown 4th of 19 in the Irish Sweeps Handicap Hurdle carrying 11-0
January 22 Naas 4th in a 14 runner handicap hurdle carrying 11-10
January 24 Navan won a handicap hurdle carrying 12-0
February 12 Fairyhouse unplaced in a 11 runner handicap hurdle
February 12 Leopardstown 3rd in the Erin Foods Champion Hurdle
March 5 Navan 3rd of 17 in a handicap hurdle carrying 12-0
March 16 Cheltenham runner up to Night Nurse in the Champion Hurdle
April 2 Liverpool dead heated with Night Nurse in the Templegate Hurdle
April 16 Naas won a 25 runner apprentice handicap on the flat under Mick Kinane
April 27 Punchestown 4th of 18 in a handicap hurdle carrying 12-41977/78
October 19 Punchestown unplaced in a 8 runner handicap hurdle
October 29 Curragh 3rd in a 21 runner flat handicap
October 31 Leopardstown 3rd in a 9 runner handicap hurdle carrying 12-2
November 5 Down Royal 3rd of 7 in a conditions hurdle
November 12 Leopardstown 9th of 22 in a flat handicap
January 21 Navan unplaced in a 8 runner handicap hurdle
February 18 Leopardstown 3rd of 16 in the Erin Foods Champion Hurdle
March 15 Cheltenham beat Sea Pigeon and Night Nurse in the Champion Hurdle
April 1 Liverpool beat Night Nurse in the Templegate Hurdle
April 19 Leopardstown won a 22 runner flat Stakes race
April 25 Naas repeated his victory in a flat apprentice handicap, again with Mick Kinane aboard
May 1 Haydock 2nd of 20 in the Royal Doulton Hurdle carrying 12 st1978/79
October 7 Curragh unplaced in a 23 runner flat handicap
October 28 Curragh unplaced in a 16 runner flat handicap
November 4 Down Royal won a 7 runner conditions Hurdle
November 25 Naas 2nd of 10 in a handicap hurdle carrying 12-4
December 2 Fairyhouse 2nd of 10 in a handicap hurdle carrying 12-0
December 27 3rd of 12 carrying 12-0 in the Irish Sweeps Handicap Hurdle
February 24 Leopardstown unplaced in the Erin Foods Champion Hurdle
Cheltenham March 14 beat Sea Pigeon and Beacon Light in the Champion Hurdle
March 31 Liverpool beat Kybo in what was now called the Colt Sigma Hurdle
April 16 Chepstow beat Bird’s Nest in the Welsh Champion Hurdle
May 7 Haydock 2nd of 17 to Beacon Light carrying 12-0 in the Royal Doulton HurdleI can just about believe Henrietta Knight had a horse which was hard to keep sound.
And I can definitely believe many trainers ever since have liked to behave as if every good horse they had was hard to keep sound.
That’s enough runs from Monksfield for an entire aggregated career of several Cheltenham prospects these days.
I am "The Horse Racing Punter" on Facebook
https://mobile.twitter.com/Ian_Davies_
https://www.facebook.com/ThePointtoPointNHandFlatracingpunter/
It's the "Millwall FC" of Point broadcasts: "No One Likes Us - We Don't Care"That’s quite informative and impressive. Running from October – May. Not only the amount of runs, and runs in handicaps, but not worrying about trying to keep an unbeaten record. In fact, using modern terms, his wins/runs percentage isn’t that impressive; however, he won the big ones, which is what counts.
As already said, a few of the current trainers would be having a fit of the vapours….
Thanks for that Cancello; brings the memories flooding back. I was at the Dec 27th 1978 meeting, in Leopardstown, when Monksfield carried 12st into 3rd, behind Chinrullah, the previous yrs wide-margin Champion Chase winner, carrying 10 st 5. It had been raining nonstop for a few days, and the ground was a quagmire, the horses splashing though the muck. And yet there was never any question of Monksfield being withdrawn.
78/79 Monksfield’s champion hurdles in his fifties work wise, and a pure grafter.
This was real racing, real Persian war, as opposed to an
accountant’s flow chart. A practiced hussy compared to a preserved Nun. Anthony Joshua take note. You’ve got a few bob…but..78 Leopardstown in the rain
82 the hash joints of Paris, Maxine’s for a nosh and then onto the wondrous femmes of the Moulin Rouge who mixed colour with fever and unrealistic expectations – after all that, travelling on to demand the fine architecture of Italy.
Where are my tablets ?
I will nevertheless watch the entire meeting on TV – muted the entire four days!
I am "The Horse Racing Punter" on Facebook
https://mobile.twitter.com/Ian_Davies_
https://www.facebook.com/ThePointtoPointNHandFlatracingpunter/
It's the "Millwall FC" of Point broadcasts: "No One Likes Us - We Don't Care"When Best Mate was around I looked up Henrietta Knight in Timeform’s “Statistical Companion”. Seem to remember the average number of runs per season of her whole yard wasn’t much better than Best Mate’s average.
Wasn’t so much she didn’t run Best Mate that often, more she rarely ran anything that often.
Value Is EverythingExtracted from a Racing Post Q&A with Henrietta Knight two years ago.
“You came in for a lot of criticism about how many times Best Mate ran – it must have given you great satisfaction to be proved right.”
“It certainly did because I’ve always said there are only a limited number of miles on the clock and you can’t go to the well too often with a top horse. The athletes running in the Olympics don’t race too many times before their big day, and the Gold Cup takes a huge amount out of any horse, whatever people may say. My aim every year was to get Best Mate right for that one race. Nowadays, Paul Nicholls more or less does the same, certainly Willie Mullins followed me this year with Al Boum Photo and Colin Tizzard as well. A lot of the top trainers are running their horses fewer times these days. I was told that I wrapped Best Mate up in cotton wool, but it didn’t do a bad job.”
It’s a soft question but the reply renders me grateful HK didn’t train Night Nurse, Monksfield, or Sea Pigeon. Or Desert Orchid. She seems pleased at being a self-styled trendsetter for Nicholls, Mullins etc. in the vexatious practice of not running horses. She should be ashamed.
Her point concerning Olympic athletes is plain wrong.
I’m sure a lot of (if not all) Olympic athletes have to qualify for their events, they don’t just enter and race. In athletics, they race plenty of times in the months before, then the National championships/selection races, then a few more races then off to the Olympics – were they have qualifying rounds.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.