More beam than face
Robin Oakley
Ase.,,s most colourful outfit of the week was not seen out until the Saturday, when David Sullivan, publisher of the Sunday Sport, wore his fuchsia-pink jacket to welcome in his winner Freefourinternet, winner of the Milcars New Stakes. Worn with the right accessories, a gorgeous blonde in precipice heels and pelmet skirt, it was certainly a bold fashion statement. Freefourinternet, it has to be said, was entirely unconcerned. But he was enjoying plenty of admiration himself after he had put in a brave performance for co-owner Sullivan and for trainer Brian Meehan in the hands of Pat Ecidery, holding off Kieren Fallon on Chianti by a neck in the Listed race.
Sullivan, the co-owner too of Birmingham City, once had 40 horses. These days he contents himself with five, asking 'How many frivolous hobbies can you have?' But there is nothing frivolous about the Sullivan operation. Normally they race the two-year-olds and sell them off. Freefourinternet was an exception, having failed to deliver what was expected of him during a two-year-old career through which Brian says he was quite easy on him. Owner and trainer always reckoned him a decent horse and now he has proved it with two victories in as many races this season. His trainer says, 'The sky's the limit', and they will be trying him in Group races now.
David Sullivan had not had a penny on Freefourinternet although, on discovering he had started at 20-1, he said he would have been tempted to. Normally, he says, he never bets on his horses. 'If it wins, you're happy enough with the prize money. If it loses, you're going to be gutted anyway, so why make it worse? Owners may be a bit rude and sharp because they have lost their money so I virtually never back mine.'
I had fancied Freefourinternet, one of those horses who does no more than he has to, after his previous Nottingham win. But if I was smiling you should have seen Willie Carson after Muja Farewell had won the /25,000 PaIan Stakes over five furlongs. Willie, who bred Muja Farewell at his Minster Stud, and who owns her with three shooting friends, was like a mother whose progeny had finished first, second and third in the egg-and-spoon race. There was more beam than face. Muja Farewell had made her seasonal reappearance only a week before at York, leading most of the way before tiring to finish fifth. Willie had been worried it might be too soon for her to come out again but trainer David Barron had called him on the Thursday and said, 'I've watched her carefully all week and looked for some little sign to tell me not to run her at Ascot and I can't find one.' The canny Yorkshire trainer clearly knows a fine tune when he hears it on the gallops and the speedy filly, who has now won four of her eight races, did it well.
The handicapper permitting, keep an eye Out next time, though, for the Highclere Thoroughbreds syndicate's Hawk. Reappearing after 327 days, he came to win his race and then blew up to finish third. The shrewd Highclere team have long been impressed with the speed this one shows on Richard Hannon's gallops and Harry Herbert regards him as an exciting prospect. That is always good enough for me.
You have to be sorry for Epsom trainer Terry Mills. His Funny Valentine, a wellbacked favourite after looking thrown in at the weights following his second in the King's Stand Stakes just four days before, finished fast in second after having anything but an easy run and will have to carry a lot more weight in future. Then in the £40,000 Ladbroke Stakes handicap the Mills-trained Nadour Al Bahr, a 25-1 shot, was beaten by just half a length by the least-fancied of John Gosden's three runners in the race. Terry told me that Nadour Al Bahr, whose past record includes placed efforts in the
German and Italian Derbies, was off for a year after injuring himself on the road in Epsom. Then he was cut and, while he had recovered physically from that indignity, 'he still seemed to think he was a colt' and was only now starting to come to himself. He too will merit future interest.
It was a wonderful Ascot week and the biggest winner of all has been racing. British Horseracing Board chairman Peter Savill took huge risks in negotiations over the Go Racing deal involving Arena Leisure, BSkyB and Channel Four, which at one stage appeared to have foundered. But racing's interests and the chance to tap into future income streams seem to have been safeguarded and there even seems to be a new degree of co-operation between the BHB and the racecourses over negotiations with the bookmakers for the future funding arrangements to replace the betting Levy.
I am doubly delighted that Peter's Royal Rebel won the Gold Cup, both because he deserved a reward for his negotiating effoles and because it was one of three winners which I tipped to this magazine's effervescent publisher Kimberly Fortier and her guests in the Spectator box on Ladies' Day, starting with Sahara Slew at 14-1. It may give me the chance of occupying this space a little longer, despite the unkind thoughts of those who suggested that a recently acquired small gong was for 'services to bookmaking'.
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