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Award winning racing journalist Paul Haigh has kindly agreed to feature in the latest of our Racing Forum celebrity Question and Answer sessions.
Paul, without doubt one of the most talented racing writers of his generation, is not afraid to express his opinions and will be well known to many of us for his challenging column in the Racing Post. In a career that has lasted longer than Paul may care to remember (or admit to) he has probably delved into every nook and cranny of the racing industry at one time or another and has written for a variety of publications along the way.
He has also recently written ‘The World’s Greatest Racecourses’, somewhat inexpicably failing miserably by omitting to include Musselburgh!
Paul has also been known to wander aimlessly around the pages of the Racing Forum, creating the odd ripple and, on one memorable occasion, a major splash (poor old Jackane!) and has been a good supporter of the forum during it’s existence.
For those who don’t know the format, forum members simply visit the ‘celebrity Q&A’ section of the forum and, in the Paul Haigh topic https://theracingforum.co.uk/cgi-bin/ikonboard/topic.cgi?forum=10&topic=28,  post a question they’d like Paul to answer.
I will close the topic in a couple of weeks time and Paul will then take the opportunity to answer.
Note from Paul – Just for a start I’d like to say this is an obvious misnomer. I’d hate anyone to think that I think I’m a celebrity, or anything like it. The medium being the message you’ve got to be on telly to be one anyway. I am however quite vain, in spite of everything. So when cormack suggested the Q&A I couldn’t stop myself from saying yes. At least I’m a pretty long-serving hack who ought to have picked up a bit of interesting information in the process of earning, or making, a living. So I hope not to bore entirely.
<br>
Zorro,
I’m a big fan.
I especially adnire journos when they go undercover. Couple this with biting satire and telling irony and you’ve got a winning article.
My question is this: was there any point when you were ingratiating yourself with Curley and Spencer that you thought you would be found out? Did you ever feel that Curley wouldn’t take you literally, and would see through your disguise, when you nominated him for racng personality of the year?
Glenn:
Bog off, please. :)  I admire both of them, though in very different ways. I don’t think I’ve ever tried to ingratiate myself with either, unless you count the trip to Zambia five years ago to see what DAFA was doing there. <br>
Hi! Paul.
Thanks for your time.
What are your thoughts on the situation where Channel 4 are paid by racing to cover meetings.
This seems totally crazy to me.
Sky pays the football authorities a large fortune to cover football. I appreciate that football has a higher profile than horse-racing but this smacks to me of the racing authorities having very little confidence in their product.
Why are they selling racing short?
Colin
Seabird:
I can’t stand C4, as you probably know if you’ve ever read anything I’ve written about it. Quite apart from my dislike for its boss and for some (not all) of the people he employs, I just find its chummy chummy/ forced laughter style revolting.<br> When it looked as though it was going to be cancelled I was delighted for racing, as I thought the harm it’s done to the sport’s image – luvvy awards from TV insiders notwithstanding – would now be at an end. When the Tote stepped in to support it, I stopped betting with it for a long time as I hated the idea of helping, even partially and indirectly, to fund the salaries of the likes of McCririck and Thompson.<br> I can, however, see the force of the argument that if a sport doesn’t get exposure in the most powerful medium, it may decline in popularity. I’m therefore torn. Is it better to have stultifying crap that’s racing related, or no coverage at all? Are more people put off racing by the way C4 covers it than are recruited? I just don’t know. <br> Is it still stultifying crap, by the way? They’ve recruited some decent, intelligent people in recent years – Alastair Down, Richard Hoiles and Nick Luck, just for examples – but I still can’t bear to watch it, so I don’t know. There was a time when I did a racing TV column, so I was in effect being paid to watch it, but still couldn’t cope with more than ten minute bites at a time. One of the reasons I asked to be relieved of the column was that I was asked not to be so consistently rude about C4, but couldn’t force myself not to be.<br> Nowadays I only watch ATR and RUK. The latter is much the better of the two, even if it does have the taint of Franklin about it and there is far too much talking. (Why do TV producers fear silence?) But at least most of those who talk do so quite seriously and sensibly. <br> Overall I’d say that if a new company produced a racing programme in which the sport was treated seriously and with the confidence that viewers will be interested without unfunny antics or gimmicks – in other words as other sports are treated by those who present them – it might be worth paying to have it on the major networks, with the hope that viewing figures would go up and the consequent increase in racing’s popularity would eventually see the cash flowing the other way. But I wouldn’t be too confident. In some countries – Singapore for example – racing has to pay not only for TV coverage but to have the cards printed in the papers.<br> I’m afraid the comparison with football just isn’t valid. Football is a non-cerebral entertainment (in spite of some twits’ attempts to intellectualise it) that any fool can understand. Hence its huge popularity. Racing isn’t. Hence its difficulty in selling itself to the sort of people who find reality TV enjoyable.<br> Anyway, it’s a dilemma, and I expect you’ve had most of these thoughts yourself.
How good is Deep Impact?:biggrin: ;)
Davidbrady:
I know this is a p**s
take question but….<br> He was the best racehorse in the world last year. Even the Post’s initially sceptical handicappers accepted that after the Arima Kinen. He was also, in his style of running, the most exciting horse I’ve seen – apart from Brigadier Gerard maybe. Like millions of Japanese I’m still in mourning about the Arc, in which I’m afraid he was let down by his humans. <br> At least Frankie agreed with me about him. He told me recently, in vino veritas, that I was right, and that the horse was "an absolute machine".<br> I trust he’s enjoying himself at stud. The only time I met him one on one he ignored all my attempts to attract his attention, which was understandable perhaps as a massive erection suggested his mind was already on other things. Can’t wait to see his progeny. (Deep Impact’s that is).Hi Paul
Racing appears to be declining in popularity in many countries. America, Hong Kong and Germany are three very different markets which (i think) have suffered a decline in interest.
Things may be holding up in the UK and Ireland (although there is a sense that there are more people watching racing and less following it…if you get my drift)
You get around a bit, so are there any markets where racing is booming (Japan?) and is there anything we (and other countries) could learn from this?
<br>Thanks for your time on this
Clivex:
I think I’ve already hinted at what seems to me the basic problem. To enjoy racing properly you have to think about it hard. As attention spans shorten the problem increases. You’re right though, the Japanese seem to have conquered it. One reason is that they’ve somehow succeeded in making racing fashionable and attractive to the young. Yutaka Take, who has (or had) a film star profile has to take plenty of the credit. But one thing they did was very simple. They persuaded young girls to come racing by every means they could think of, including, I think, free entry. The boys naturally followed. One of the most amazing things about race meetings in Japan is the number of young couples you see walking round hand in hand. I don’t think it would be that hard to persuade people here or elsewhere that going racing is a ‘cool’ date. The Australians are already very good at it. You should see the ‘lawn parties’ (fenced off from more staid racegoers) they have. <br> I take the point about the difference between watching and following, and to be honest most of the lawn party set are there to drink and score. But the trick surely is to convince the young that going racing is fun. At least some of them will then surely become real fans.
Hi Zorro,
Not exactly a relevant question, but surely the Jewish pogrom in York was at Clifford’s Tower, not in The Shambles?
More on the racing theme …. how well do you think the British and Irish media cover international racing, compared with the media output from other countries?
<br>Hi, Sal
I’ll stand corrected on the pogrom at Clifford’s Tower. Maybe I read somewhere they were chased through the Shambles. Not sure. Sorry.
I don’t really know about the Irish media, but I reckon the British media do a goodish job on international racing. Not perhaps as good as in some countries where interest in international competition is greater, but still…<br> The question is: should the media lead interest, or follow it? Most media people would say the latter, and they’d probably be right. As a passionate convert to internationalism though I can’t understand the attitude of many British punters who’d rather take an interest in a seller at Southwell than in an international G1 outside these shores. But if they do, they do. We preachers will just have to keep preaching. There is no sport that hasn’t benefited from international competition, and no major sport that’s remained major without it.
Zorro..Two questions…Why did the Racing Post not knock out their "Horses of 2006" annual this year ? I really enjoyed the previous ones and am rather peeved that they have been discontinued. Don’t tell me…lack of sales.
Second, how would YOU like to improve the Racing Post ?
Black Sam Bellamy:
I’m afraid Horses of 2006 didn’t make it because Horses of 2005 just didn’t make money. Sad, because it was an excellent publication, but true.
I think the Racing Post is an excellent publication too (would you expect me to say anything else?) but nothing is beyond improvement. I’ve never wanted to be editor, and certainly no-one has ever wanted me to edit, but if some rich nutter took it over and said ‘Go on Paul, do what you like for a few months’, I would take the following measures.
1. Slap around (metaphorically) the people who have come to regard and even refer to the paper as a ‘product’. A biscuit or a sausage is a product, and has to be designed with no other thought in mind than to give the consumer what he wants. A newspaper, a decent one anyway, has to have commitment to objective truth, over and above what’s assumed to be best for it economically. That makes it something bigger than just a product. I’m not saying the Post doesn’t have that commitment – it does – but the use of the word ‘product’ to describe it seems to me as though it could be the thin end of a dangerous wedge.
2. Make it less of a cheerleading parish newssheet (see above) and more a campaigning paper. I would like to see it in the forefront of the campaign to keep racing clean rather than just a reporter of the HRA’s attempts to do so.
3. In order to do this it would be necessary to break the cosy relationship that exists between hacks and racing’s stars. I would like to see professionals criticised for poor performances just as other sportsmen are criticised, and would particularly like to see more attention drawn to any that arouse suspicion of wrongdoing (within the laws of libel obviously).<br> The perception that in doing this we’d be ‘driving down trade’ by putting people off racing is a false one. If you make a paper too bland – and there is a danger of this even if we are some way away from it – you don’t gain readers, you lose them eventually. If the public doesn’t see the main racing paper as a watchdog for the sport, the popularity of the sport will suffer, and so will the paper’s profitability.<br> In general I think the paper at the moment is a bit too anxious to be loved by racing’s insiders. To be honest I’d rather it was feared. Our monopoly position should give us the courage for that.
4. I’d like to introduce drastic rationing on superlatives. If you use them up on every trainer who lands a handicap, or every jockey who wins a race he shouldn’t have lost, you devalue the currency and you’ve got nothing left for truly memorable races like this year’s Oaks and Derby.
5. Having said that, I think there are some really talented and clever people writing for it now (life was a lot easier for people like me in the old days) and that they’re all genuine enthusiasts. Considering that you can’t punt without it – internet form study doesn’t quite work yet as you can’t look at it anywhere you like and do need to see the markets while you’re studying – it is fantastic value at £1.50. (Its US counterpart, which is less good, costs nearly twice as much)
Paul you consistently have a pop at certain TV presenters on your column on the RP, but Mc Cririck seems to get your goat more than others. Having a column on the RP puts you on a pulpit with a kind of free reign to say what you like, so as a respected journalist some people who previously liked John Mc Cririck now dislike him, well Paul Haigh says so, so he must be an idiot. Yes Mc Cririck is arrogant and opinionated, but I find him quiet funny and is quiet happy to own up if he is wrong, also think he does a lot for punters by not going native like a lot of other sycophantic presenters.<br>I would say there is a little bit of history between you, maybe a little spat in the past ???.  I find it hard to believe you just don’t like the guy from listening to him on TV, as he has been on the recieving end of your vitriol so many times, too numerous to mention.
Maybe you might enlighten us Paul !
Madman Marz:
I don’t like McCririck and I’m pleased to say he doesn’t like me. There is some history involving an historic libel case. Well, it was historic only in that it was the first occasion one journalist on a newspaper sued another on the same paper, but I can’t go into it as it would involve repeating the libel. But essentially it’s just mutual distaste. I have to say it amazes me that people think he does a lot for racing and for punters. In my opinion he always does what he can for John McCririck, and the association in the public mind between racing and his image has been very harmful to racing.
Zoz
The great 20th Century philosophers such as Sartre, Camus and de Beauvoir penned mighty works around the concept of existentialism.
You tend to write about Bouncy Castles at Sandown Park.
Does this make you feel:
a) A complete tit, or
b) Quite superior, ‘cos the silly French ponces are all dead, so who’s laughing now, eh?
Mike
Mike
Can’t remember having written lately about bouncy castles, but the answers are (a) yes, and (b) yes.
Zorro,
Racing Finances seem paradoxical at the moment – more race meetings and races, more punters attending race meetings but the return to owners as a % of their costs falling and way behind all other mature racing countries.<br>Course facilities for the average punter are improving but for the owners are are either shrinking or a being diluted by selling more member tickets to crowd the existing facilities.
Does this matter? ( because we have always found owners by syndicates, newly wealthy business men etc)<br>or are we witnessing the early decline of British Racing?
Should we move away from the bums on seat philosophy and deliberately market racing as a luxury pursuit as achieved one meeting a year at Ascot, Chester and York? or is the present "go racing campaign" the correct way? in your opinion based on practice in other countries.
Galejade:
Sometimes you have to admit it it when you just don’t know. The one thing I do know is that at the root of all racing’s financial problems is the fact that the bookmaking industry skims most of the profit that in other countries goes towards making the sport strong – and ownership profitable. In many ways racing in this country defies gravity. If only we could have given it a financial structure similar to other countries’, think how strong it would be.
Zorro, was The Sportsman destined to fail? Do you think its right that The Racing Post effectively has an unchallenged monopoly on racing publications?
<br>Flatseasonlover:
Yes, I do think it was destined to fail. And that’s not aftertiming. Prufrock will confirm I told him so before it even launched. The reason should have been obvious to anyone who witnessed the Post’s struggle with the Life. The Post lost fortunes in the first few years. Only because Sheikh Mohammed refused to accept defeat, and had the money to be able to refuse, was it able to survive. No-one behind The Sportsman had Sheikh Mohammed’s income or his determination that, whatever it cost, the paper would succeed.<br> The Post only has a monopoly on daily racing publication. No, that’s probably not ideal, but after the example of The Sportsman it will be a long time before that monopoly is challenged again, if it ever is. Surely there would have to be a huge upsurge in racing’s popularity to make people even consider the viability of a second paper.<br> By the way, I remember the first time I went to the Velka Pardubicka going to the Czech embassy for a visa. The then communist officials’ incredulity that there was even one newspaper dedicated solely to horseracing, never mind TWO, was wonderful to behold. They kept looking at me as though they’d have loved to take me down the cells for some proper interrogation, and muttering words that sounded like "Broznichee" into big old telephones. Clearly they thought I was lying and only wanted to go to Pardubice to blow up the Semtex factory
Where do you stand on the current debacle of the SP process?
Davidbrady (again):
Sorry but I’m really not qualified to have an opinion about that, although I do suspect that however the SP is calculated – and increasingly it seems the on course market is too weak to provide a good indicator – the big bookmakers will find a way to take control of it.
Hi Paul,
I saw you on tv a few weeks ago and you’re looking very well for your age[61?] if you don’t mind me saying. Anyway,have you learned how to copy and paste yet?
Jilly:
Thankyou Jilly. 62 actually.<br> No, I haven’t. Strangely I’m quite proud of that. At least no-one can accuse me of doing ‘cut and paste jobs’. :)
What would be in your Room 101 (it can be a large room, about the size of the reading room at The British Library)?
What advice would you have for a budding racing journalist (other than "don’t")?
And how good was Deep Impact?
Prufrock, I’m assuming you mean the TV version, that allows you to dump all the things you hate, rather than the Orwellian one that contains your greatest fear. (God, how TV twists everything. What would George have thought of "Big Brother"?).
If the TV version, and if we’re talking only about racing:<br>(1) Lots of TV presenters just for themselves. I won’t name them. You can guess.<br>(2) Ian Mackenzie, Dougie Frazer, Darren Owen and especially Dale McKeown, just for their voices. (Sorry gentlemen. You don’t have to listen to mine). <br>(3) All post-race analysis on TV, particularly from those who start speaking the moment the winner has crossed the line. I don’t want to be told what I’ve just seen, and certainly not by some ill informed but self-important twit who’s probably had less chance to look at the race than I have. The only post-race analysis worth listening to comes from those who’ve studied the race as many times as there are runners, from as many angles as are available, and in slow motion as well as real speed. It’s hard work, and they don’t give their views away cheaply. I’d just have silent re-runs after each race, from every camera angle if there’s time; but TV producers are terrified of silence, so it will never happen I suppose. Have you noticed too how post-race "analysts" put on a special ‘well, it was all obvious’ voice for their vapourings? I’d like to employ very fat men to sit on them.<br>(4) The bookmaking industry (except, I suppose) for my mates at Country Boy of Cambridge, as was; and Sports Bookmakers of Hoddesdon, as is) and some of the bookmakers’ PR men who are good blokes but should get another job.<br>(5) Southwell – unless they switch to a proper artificial surface.<br>(6) Anyone who tries to persuade us to call it South-well. (In chains).<br>(7) Dirt racing. Time to change to Tapeta or Polytrack.<br>(8) Soccer. I love calling it that because it irritates soccer lovers so much. (I know I’m trying to stick to racing, but I can’t resist it).<br>(9) Soccer players – overpaid, cheating little b*****d
s – and their moronic wags.<br>(10) Jump racing. I was going to say just ‘summer jumping’. But the whole lot can go in. I’m sick of it.If the Orwellian version:
(1) Bush, Blair and all who’ve contributed to the degeneration of our society and American society since September 11, 2001. Including torturers, those who run secret prisons, Guantanamo Bay; and, of course, all murderers and injustice defenders on both sides of "The War on Terror".<br> (2) Vladimir Putin.
Advice to budding racing journalist: Set out to enjoy it, and remember you’re not doing anything that really matters (if anything does) so don’t get too self-important.
Deep Impact was a lot better than anyone in Britain – except Nick Godfrey and me (I know it should be ‘I’, but it sounds awful, so sod off, pedants) – thinks. :)
I would like to ask Paul:
On your way up the career ladder to where you stand now what was the best piece of advice you were ever given, and who was it given by?
Thanks,<br>Sulekha
*crosspost…also placed question in the right thread!*
(Edited by lekha85 at 2:58 am on May 17, 2007)
Sulekha:
Not sure how far up the career ladder that is. Can’t remember any advice, good or bad, except Mike Harris’s about which side of a full stop the quotation marks should go in interviews. Which I think I’ve forgotten. I’ve been given a few bollockings I suppose, notably after articles/columns that have been deemed offensive and have therefore been stuck on the spike, but I’m not sure they count. And I can’t remember them either.<br>
Thanks for all these questions. Even Sarcy Glenn :cool:<br>I was actually quite worried after Cormack suggested it that there wouldn’t be any.<br>Having quite a nice time in Singapore at the moment. Will try and give some sensible replies when home/recovered/sober.
<br>Can say, however, that I think Deep Impact was quite a good horse.<br>
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