26th February 2018

En Meme Temps is fine after his run at Chepstow on Saturday, I don’t have any concerns about his future.  Yesterday we took 6 horses for an away day, given the weather forecast we thought we better get a step ahead of ourselves and it looks as if it may have been a very sensible thing to do. Taunton and Wincanton have cancelled their meetings later in the week already.

Typical Monday morning canters for all the horses, those that worked yesterday had a quiet hack up the hill.  

I am in the process of topping up the woodchip gallop, 3 loads of woodchip arrived today with 6 due tomorrow. The digger, dumper, loading shovel and roller are on site ready for an early start. The job will be completed by Wednesday lunchtime if not before. I have an obsession with gallop depth ands beleive most stress fractures are caused through a lack of it. 

Point to pointing in this country has a long way to go to catch up with Ireland, that doesn’t mean we, in the UK can’t produce championship horses. Blackbow and North Hill Harvey are prime examples, there has been numerous before them and will be numerous after them. The Irish bring hundreds of horses to market each year through the point to point field and we will never compete numbers wise. There are of course many Irish and English p2p horses who never make any impression on the track, that is the nature of the business.

My point is, at Brocklesby a couple of weekends ago there was no filming of the races. I have looked and questioned why.

A media company was approached to film the races by the organizing committee, they were asked to pay the same fee as any trade stand. The media company refused to pay.

The whole episode is poor, the organizing committee should want to enhance their event and if necessary employ, or at least invite a media company to film.  The fact that the media company could have made money should not be the deciding factor in whether or not they are allowed to attend.  The organizing committee believed that the media company should have taken some of the risks involved by the hunt in staging a p2p by paying a fee. It appears that a stale mate evolved, resulting in no filming. As is the case all too often in the UK, the committee thought of no one other than themselves and acted in a very selfish manner. I do not know the numbers of subscribers to the UK p2p site but many will have have paid for premier membership to watch the videos of the races. In this case, their membership fee is wasted. By comparison, if you are a paid up member of the Irish p2p site you can watch a recording of the weekends fixture the following day. At best we have to wait until Wednesday, more often that not Thursday. Those in charge, (if there is anyone) of policing committees need to get together and sort this out. Incidents like this do nothing to help promote or enhance our sport to a wider audience. I appreciate, on occasions a media company may not be available to film but when they are they should be welcomed with opened arms to enhance any fixture and the whole experience for those involved. Of course, I would have liked a video of Port of Mars for the sale. No more so than the owner, lad or lass having their first ride or runner. The committee at Brocklesby acted in a selfish and thoughtless manner worrying about a third party making a few pounds without adding to their coffers. Very short sighted behavior indeed. May I suggest, next year they add a pound to the entry fees in order to cover the media company or look for a sposnor of it. Had they not of lined the paddock with loud speakers turned up to maximun volume they may have had enough funds to accomadate the media company.

The next time anyone bleats about the state of point to pointing in this country they should look at the organising hunt commitee. The Heythrop Hunt have proved you can make a p2p pay on a freezing cold day in January. If you put in you generally get out. The Ledbury rebranded their p2p to Gloucester Races, increased their marketing which resulted in a full house to the point that they are going to look for addtional car parking next year and run buses in and out of Gloucester.  

A man contacted me today and wishes to name a horse after his great friend and one of my existing owners. It will be named Little Welsh Git.