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Have been following Patrick Cantlay from his amateur days to his almost disappearing without trace to his comeback and rapid rise up the rankings. Back him almost blindly and while not a brilliant record in this he does have a top 10 finish.
My favourite stat by far is the SGT2G and Corey Connors has consistently been high up on this stat for a couple of years but some ropey putting has limited him to just two career successes in the same weakish tournament. He does have a good Augusta record though and I can’t resist. Haven’t touched Tommy Fleetwood since he threw a couple of tournaments away through flakey putting at the end of 2020. However he’s back on the winning trail recently, is another always high up SGT2G and think he might have a big week.Just to tidy up what I wrote on Billy Beardwood as it was done on memory without a search to be more precise – he passed away in 1998 at the young age of exactly 40.
Have checked his record as a conditional rider in the old Timeform Annuals – he was listed in 1975 as W.A.Beardwood, then became W.A.J Beardwood from 1976 onwards. He rode four winners in all, one in 77/78 and three in 80/81. His riding career concluded in 1982. He was attached to the McCain yard for all this period and I believe left at this stage.
The jockeypedia site have him working for John Jenkins after, another source link him to a period as head lad to Alan Jarvis. What I do know is that in the summer of 1986 he was back working quote locally to the area where the McCain yard is pre schooling ect. – but not sure how long he remained in the business from then until his passing. Was arguably the most recognisable stable lad in the history of UK racing.
A delightful thread – finished work yesterday then opened a bottle of Primitivo ( wine club not supermarket!), watched a Morse and an early Two Ronnies from my box sets, then went through this thread viewing all the material from the links.
Billy Ellison was Rummy’s lad in the early days,followed by Billy Beardwood who had a couple of rides as a conditional. He left the yard in the 80’s going on to breaking in and pre training horses with a tiny older chap nicknamed (without much imagination) ‘Jockey’. He passed away in his 40’s – think it may have been a cardiac.
Cheekpieces do look visually horrid, as do flashy bridles and blinds. Not sure about plaits and nosebands though. The Tom Jones horses seemed to be always plaited along with sheepskin nosebands, with no leather jacket or t-shirt attired lads – sometimes a full three piece suit job with trilby too.
I once spoke to someone who worked there in the early 80’s and it was stand to attention at evening stables with grooming brushes and combes laid out neatly outside. This at a time when that military style routine was beginning to become outdated. Mind you some big achievers served learning time there.
Andy Pandy must have still had plenty left in the tank judging by the way he quickly reappeared and won the Whitbread – though jumping was at that time truly the name of the game in Grand Nationals.
Have just watched this and it reminds that I once came across an original canvas painting for sale in some quaint York city centre shop depicting the Gold Cup where he beat Leap Frog. Was very pricey too if memory serves.
Another Moore animal worth mentioning is Feroda who won the 2m novice chase at Aintree on the Friday, then reappeared to win the opening Captain Morgan the following day.
He’s listed with an Irish 2023 fee of 30,000 Euro, up from 25,000 Euro for the previous season thanks mainly to Vadini, and he’s not residing at any of the of their three NH stud.
Their highest two advertised NH fees for this year are Crystal Ocean and Soldier of Fortune both at 8,000, Walk In The Park is listed as ‘private’ though he has fertility issues.I know that Richi Ricci sent a couple of his mares to Australia two years ago but at 25,000 I don’t think they have plans to mark him as ‘dual purpose’ anytime soon.
I think the highest fee anywhere for a dual purpose stallion at the moment is Doctor Dino in France who I believe stands for around 20,000 Euro.
I chuckle at how things are now coming back to back to bite ‘them’. I’ll give an example – for the Thursday of Aintree ( one of the best value days of the year admission wise), four of us are normally in the mix to go. Two of us are genuine racing fans and like to visit the paddock and go down to the last flight of hurdles for a couple of races, while the other two are happy to stand in the bar all day and chat about anything but racing.
When we have a full house of all four it usually ends with a compromise of a beer between every race but managing to drag the two non converted to the final hurdle for one race, the paddock for one race, and the slope for the Foxhunters – however, after the alarming price increases in the booze at the meeting last year the two non converted have understandably been pushed over the edge by the rip off culture and probably won’t be visiting any racecourse ever again.
Thus if the two of us who are racing fans go, we’ll not have a single alcoholic drink between us as we’d rather be out and about.So the loss for the course is the cost of 24 overpriced drinks, 4 overpriced burgers or fish chips, 4 admission payments – versus 2 admission payments, 2 x £2.60 cans of coke, nil beers, nil food. No doubt many could come up with countless similar examples at Cheltenham last week.They are reaping what they have sewn.
And call me bitter and twisted but I am now in the habit of encouraging non racing fans to keep clear of racecourses and have even half considered purchasing a ledger type book to record estimates of the money lost to the courses due to my own interventions.
Highs: The first time I’ve had any positive thoughts over the introduction of the Mares Hurdle, as while there were two previous CH winners that would have added some ‘body’ to the CH (even without altering the order of the first two home) they may likely have not turned up at all without the new race.
Low: Although the Gold Cup was pleasing for the connoisseurs with two class acts filling the first two places – the downside is( without trying to be a harbour of doom) just knowing that there is a fair chance that one of them, or God forbid even both, will incur setbacks and not produce their optimums ever again. For every Best Mate, The Fellow, Kauto, Denman, you could cite a long, long list that went wrong and just did not regain their fizz. In fact there are few that return to anything near their best after setbacks – Imperial Call nearly back to his best, and Pendil as a 12 year old after two years out won his first three back and ran Fort Devon to a close margin in the Fulwell at Kempton but they are rare. Sprinter Sacre over shorter and Cyfor Malta too, in relatively recent years but by God, A Plus Tard looked a cracking, above average winner just 12 months previous.
A bit of an understatement to add on the subject of Dinoblue that ” Thyne Hill also made a mistake” – it was cruising when falling, something they did not want to show. They also did not show Mahler Mission going the other day. They were both crucial parts of these races – why show the sport if they blot bits out. Who are they kidding?
As an extreme example, Quixall Crossett ran in a novice chase on his 8O something start over fences. Ridiculous!
They’ve been on the PGA Tour website for a good few years – perhaps ten or more, and to be fair they do serve as a good early week appetizer for later in the week, though the write ups under each ranking are typically Americanized.
No doubt the term ‘ Power Rankings’ was taken from the PGA Tour Website, which every Monday carries a feature of the same name listing their rankings for the coming week’s tournament based on course history / suitability, current form ect as opposed to official rankings. The RP ones I suppose in a sense are similar except that they are not drawn up for a coming particular race though to be honest I’ve never looked at them and have no inclination to do do.
T Rex’s ‘ The Slider’ album is first rate from start to finish, without filler. Although I was at that age when I sold out to Punk from 1977 onwards (attending concerts too), I now look back and cringe and would put the first six years of the decade as the period when so many great performers were at their ultimate peak – Stones, The Who,Led Zep, Sabbo, Deep Purple, Wishbone Ash,Clapton, Bowie ( though some who prefer the discoey sound would say late 70’s),ELO( again some would disagree and say late 70’s), Bad Company (Paul Ritchie up there with the owners of the best rock singing voices) – Queen too. IMO their best album was Sheer Heart Attack released in 1974, though the preceding Queen 11, and the following Night At The Opera and Day At The Races are in the mix too Many disagree and reckon they peaked in the 80’s but they sounded part cabaret band to me by then. And that Live Aid performance that they all go on about – I believe they were only in stage for just over 20 mins. I’ve still yet to watch it – I was at York races that day; it was Magnet Cup Day.
I consider the 1970’s to be the best ever music wise and that when the decade ended, every musical avenue worth trying had been tried – I’d go as far to say that each individual year in the 1970’s was superior to the entire 1980’s, and I’ve spent a couple of grand down the years buying albums on i tunes that I once owned or still do own on vinyl or cassette.
However, while Dark Side Of The Moon was one of the iconic albums of the era and perhaps a candidate for having the most memorable cover photo in the history of the business, I was not won over and found it overall morbidish and grey for some reason. Within four weeks of the release both Houses Of The Holy and Aladdin Sane came out, Billion Dollar Babies four weeks earlier, and Band On The Run a previous four weeks before that. You could not make it up and similar pockets of quality releases were not uncommon at the time.
