It's hard to recall a time when UK racing has contained so many individuals in positions of power, or with public platforms to freely express their opinions, who are prepared to use these priveliged positions to promote their agendas.
We know there is a sinister wokeness winding it's way through the sport, with those spreading its word often having selfish motives, finding a niche that will provide them a meal ticket for the remainder of their careers - that is if their assessment of public opinion is correct.
There have also been some strange appointments - Anne Marie Phelps was brought in from the world of rowing to take the position as chair of the BHA. She may have held similar positions in her Olympian sport but listening to her being interviewed with her championing of modernisation and what she herself identifies as changing times, then you cannot help but conclude that there must have been more suitable candidates out there.
The racecourses themselves have some characters in positions of power who have taken the sport backwards rather than enhanced it. The sorry tale of the demise of Haydock Park's old, feared and respected steeplechase course, has been spitefully criticised multiple times around the forums, particularly by those of us who visited regularly when it was in its pomp, but we'll never be given it back though many would chuckle if the present model, based on mopping up summer evening and weekend drinkers, nosedived in fortunes causing the venue to perish - fact is, there are going to be hordes of people emerging from these lockdowns with less disposable income, and even those fully financially intact may have changed habits for good, as there are going to be more people who have transformed into oddballs than ever before.
Then we have Chester - they had a wake up call on their first welcoming of returning audiences when they failed to sell out to the numbers allowed, after hiking up their already overpriced tickets. This from over estimating their venue's popularity and finding there were less idiots amongst their patrons than they bargained for.
And, in another embarrassing episode for this over rated, greedy and arrogant venue, former frontman Richard Thomas was forced to step down from his position after it was discovered that he was using finances from the course for his own 'projects'.
And what of Ascot. In a climate where our festivals are being stretched, diluted, and partly ruined, the Berkshire course's Director of Racing Nick Smith firmly made a statement, as if fact, that the extra races have not diluted the quality, something they've been guilty of doing for years.
Take the sprinters for starters - there was a time when the Kings Stand Stakes was, along with Gold Cup, the only Group 1 race staged at the meeting, this at a time when the now out of control Pattern, was still protected.
Then, in an attempt to balance the sprint programme, the Pattern Committee downgraded the King's Stand and upgraded the old Vernons Sprint Cup which has had God only knows numerous titles since. They then gradually lost all sense of proportion - the King's Stand returned to it's former Group 1 status, the Cork and Orrey was moved to a supposedly one off Royal Saturday in Golden Jubilee year, and run as the Golden Jubilee Stakes with Group 1 status. They told us ay the time it was probably just going to be a one off but as many suspected, once the extra day was added to replace the old Ascot Heath Saturday, then there was going to be no turning back.
And if we thought that was one step too far in diluting quality, we now have another Group 1 sprint, the Commonwealth Cup, confined to three year olds. You could go through all the events with a fine tooth comb and come up with a multitude of present examples of how the present meeting would be enhanced in quality if it resembled the meeting from half a century back, and conversely how poorer the meeting would have been in the 1970's if connections had so many options to choose from.
One example of how less the anticipation is on the run up to the meeting can be appreciated by looking at Michael Stoute's wonderful Habitat filly Marwell. Anyone underestimating her in their memory should maybe consider that six years after Marwell's three year old season of 1981, Stoute trained the admirable Ajdal to win the July Cup, Nunthorpe, and the Haydock Sprint Cup. Ajdal had also won the Dewhurst, been beaten when a warm favourite for the 2,000 Guineas, then in a rare error of judgment by his great trainer, had run in the Derby. Still, he found his niche as a wonderful sprinter but Stoute is in no doubt whatsoever that Marwell was superior and without doubt the best sprinter he has had through his hands.
Marwell was a speedy two year old during 1980 and went into the winter as a leading fancy for the 1,000 Guineas, the general consensus being that if she stays she wins. After lasting out over seven furlongs on her reappearance to win the Fred Darling, her stamina alas proved her undoing at Newmarket, only managing fourth spot behind Fairy Footsteps.
Then, returned to sprinting, she took the Gus Demmy at Haydock before lining up for the King's Stand, something that would not happen now as the Commonwealth Cup would provide an easier Group 1 option, though if the King's Stand was the choice, that too is not the mountain to climb it once was as the older horses have the option of running in the Golden Jubilee - thus you have a King's Stand in which the three year olds find it easier to avoid for the Commonwealth, and in which some of the older horses can pick and choose between that and the Golden Jubilee, or even run in both.
There was a buzz leading up to Marwell 's King Stand, her main rival was the previous year's Nunthorpe winner Sharpo. He disappointed and this was the race were Stoute's filly truly arrived on the all aged sprinting scene, stamping herself as a performer of the highest class and laying down her claim to be the champion of that division in a golden era for sprinters. It's history now that she went on to defeat the best sprinter of the previous year, Moorestyle, in the July Cup, before both were beaten by a back to his best Sharpo at York, then finally, in the Prix de l' Abbaye, Marwell reversed the form with her York conqueror and ended the season with Timeform's highest rating for the year in the sprinting division.
Now, the spin put on things is that the three year olds are given the option of the Commonwealth Cup and they can always come back the following year for one of the other sprint races. Admittedly, some sprinters have a preference for six furlongs over five and vice versa but most of the genuine top class animals can cut the mustard over both.
Moreover there was an unmistakable buzz in the air when, as early as June, the established older sprinters crossed paths with rivals who are potentially the best three year old speedsters as the more they avoid each other the less likely they may ever meet while at their optimums.
And this is just the sprinting division - no need to go into other areas to demonstrate how poorer the somewhat multiple choice fixture now is. They can say what they like, they are talking garbage.
image from Clipart library
This is the title track of an album released during Mill Reef and Brigadier Gerard's classic year. In an episode of The Lovers, Paula Wilcox picks up the album in a record shop, while in one of the early episodes of Van Der Valk, this track can be heard playing in some dodgy Amsterdam bar. There was no watering down the quality in the racing world though, in fact 1971 was the very first year of the now, not fit for purpose, 'Pattern',
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