Racing’s name-game can be a strange old business
SATURDAY is Whitbread Gold Cup day. Or rather, it isn’t. While a few of us still think of it like that, it is in fact 22 years since Whitbread ceased sponsorship. Calling it ‘the Bet365’ is becoming a little easier, though they won’t thank me for that, seeing as they have sponsored it since 2008.
I have wondered what some of the Cheltenham Festival sponsors get for their money. What is Brown Advisory? Who are Close Brothers? That two-and-a-half mile novices chase is ‘the Turners’. Who are they? What do they do? Engineering, retail, housebuilding? If you search the Companies House register for ‘Turner’ 33,578 entries are revealed. It struck me again the other day when driving past a lorry with Turners on the side of it, and five minutes later I saw another one. Spurred by this to investigate, I found that the Cheltenham Turner is indeed the lorry firm. Funnily enough, it is based near Newmarket. Two brothers founded it in 1930 and now it’s one of the biggest privatelyowned haulage businesses in the country. They have 2,300 vehicles.
It’s not completely obvious from the name what ‘Brown Advisory’ do. They are an American firm of stockbrokers – though nowadays they are called ‘investment managers’. They generally require their clients to have $5 million for them to play with, so I think I will have to keep my spare cash in the building society. ‘Close Brothers’ could be anything, but they are in fact commercial moneylenders. Sorry, they “provide financial support and advice to small businesses and individuals in the UK.” Again, I can’t show my appreciation for them by going to buy anything of theirs. Unlike ‘Albert Bartlett’, which I knew supplied potatoes. Not that I remember seeing any with their branding.
In most, if not all of these cases, the company directors love racing. It’s good that they pour money into it, but I find it odd that they don’t add a word into the race title that says what their business is.
Despite all the festivals of the last month or so, there are still enough horses to give us top-class racing on Saturday. It’s not very original, but Paul Nicholls and Harry Cobden could well be among the winners. Greaneteen has been trained for this race on his favourite course and is taken to beat Jonbon and Editeur Du Gite in the Celebration Chase. Interestingly, Cobden prefers Solo to McFabulous in the Oaksey Chase, but Hewick should win provided he has recovered from his fall at a late stage in the Gold Cup.
Cobden is on Enrilo in the Bet365, a race the horse so nearly won two years ago. His form figures since then are FP4P-FP6, but he’s another who will have had this as his target for a long time and there are worse 14/1 shots.
At the same price Gordon Elliott’s The Goffer, fourth in the Ultima behind Corach Rambler and Fastorslow – that race has worked out well – is also a possibility. You’d think this would come too soon for Kitty’s Light after his Scottish National victory last week.