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How are the points calculated? Sorry if it is staring me in the face, but I can’t see it mentioned in this thread.
Purwell, it is quite an achievement to get everyone who posts on this thread to agree on something, but I think you’ve done it!
Wishing you all the very best in the next stage of treatment. Fingers very much crossed for you.
HCMW, Moonax was lovable from afar! He was one of those equine characters who make the game more interesting. Although he wasn’t unique to be a winner of a British Classic who ran over hurdles, I believe he remains the most recent. Certainly nobody could accuse Barry Hills of failing to campaign his horses adventurously.
It was interesting to hear more of Moonax’s story Moehat; I will get hold of a copy of that book you mentioned.
Below is Moonax’s finest hour in the St Leger. I remember feeling a bit sorry for Broadway Flyer on the day after he put in a very game front-running performance only to be passed late on. Interesting to see that the grand stayer Double Trigger was back in third.
Sad to hear of the passing of another giant of the sport, my sincere condolences to his family and friends.
The three Hills horses who most linger in my memory are the tough as nails Further Flight, the lovable eccentric Moonax, and a rare Jumps star for the stable, Nomadic Way. The video below is his win in the Stayers’ Hurdle in 1992.
RIP Barry Hills
Yes, I’d not seen them perform since he passed away, but thought his absence was dealt with well, and he was clearly very much present in spirit still.
A marvellous horse, who had a very long and varied career.
He won over a million pounds, and completed every single one of his 80 races. 58 of these were over hurdles.
It sounds as if he was well-loved in retirement, which is wonderful to hear.
RIP Thousand Stars
The French miler Solow is another fairly recent top-class grey, though his peak was now a decade ago.
I think British racing’s profile has diminished sufficiently that a racehorse of any colour would struggle to capture the public imagination nowadays. The recent dual National winner Tiger Roll never came remotely close to having the fame of Red Rum, for example.
Grey horses are eyecatching, and I am sure this helps make them more memorable to those who engage with racing on a casual basis. It’s an interesting question as to whether Desert Orchid would have been as popular with the general public if he hadn’t been grey. I suspect his colour did contribute towards his popularity.
There’s some information on how Retraining of Racehorses is funded at present at the link below. Owners pay a small levy on each entry fee, currently £3 per entry.
https://www.ror.org.uk/about-us/funding
Without wishing to diminish the excellent efforts and generous contributions made by some, there is still colossal room for improvement in this area. I agree with the previous comments that all parties who benefit from the sport should be making a significant contribution.
100% agree zilzal, it beggars belief that the stewards felt it was worth commenting that Stark Warning had been wearing earplugs, but not that he was dead.
To be fair, the horse could have been put down later in the day after the stewards’ report was filed, but the fact that the second favourite had pulled up early in the race was surely worthy of mention. I believe all horse injuries and deaths on the track should be reported as routine.
It certainly doesn’t look like “the horse comes first” as one of the previous industry public relations lines claimed.
And now he’s recorded on the BHA database as dying the same day as he was pulled up at Chester.
I won’t post separately in the Memorials section just yet as the admins may decide to move this thread to there.
RIP Stark Warning
Seemingly not worthy of mention by the stewards, which reflects very poorly on both them and the oversight of British racing in my view.
Don’t worry though, as the crucial fact that the horse wore earplugs beforehand has been recorded for posterity.
Not sure how this one slipped through the net, but forum favourite Music Society was added to the BHA’s non-racing agreements list in February!
Wishing him a long and happy retirement.
Nathan, it appears Music Society has been retired. He is on the BHA’s non-racing agreements list with a date of 25 February 2025.
The golden age of the Easterby stable had passed by the time I developed an interest in racing, but it did not take long to glean that the trainer and his equine stars were titans of the sport. What some of them achieved seems unbelievable nowadays, truly the stuff of legend.
I am glad he reached such a great age. A life very well lived.
RIP Peter Easterby
I know that a lot of people attending the Derby could not tell a good racehorse from a bad one, but it’s notable that the decline in the race’s attendance mirrors the decline in its stature.
Winning the Derby is nowhere near as prestigious as it used to be. More and more high profile international races seem to be chipping away at its place in the pecking order.
Even if it was a poor year, the idea of the Derby winner being gelded to continue racing rather than going to stud would have been unthinkable a couple of decades ago, yet that is the fate that befell Serpentine after his victory in 2020.
