ROBERT COOPER
Sky Racing correspondent asks, Who would be a handicapper?
Beggars can’t be choosers but the two jobs in racing I would least relish would to be a jockey’s agent or a handicapper. I’ve never been over fond of the telephone; I’d owned a mobile for a year before it rang, and the thought of ringing grumpy trainers at dawn fills me with dread and apprehension, let alone informing the jockeys I represent that they’ve got another day off. I am full of admiration for top agents Dave Roberts and Tony Hind, and how Racing TV presenter Niall Hannity can spend the morning booking rides for his entourage and then face the cameras at some far-flung outpost, leaves me speechless.
The handicapper faces an impossible task. How can you ever have a good day when the level of excellence you strive for is to see 15 horses in a handicap flash past the winning post separated by a whisker? It’s never going to happen. Also the phone comes into play here too, because the grouchy trainer who gave short shrift to an agent just minutes ago, is haranguing you for putting his horse up 7lbs for beating, for what he or she perceives, as a load of donkeys.
The actual process of handicapping is probably fascinating, studying and assessing form, and probably re-evaluating a race that you initially thought was better than it has turned out, and vice versa. It becomes a never-ending circle, and is your end game to give a horse a chance of victory by reducing its handicap rating, or to penalise a winning horse so severely that it may never win again? A horse can rocket up the ratings by, say a stone, after a couple of wins and then take the rest of its racing career to fall to a level where it can win again.
Of course, there has to be a guide and ratings are a vital measuring tool of a horse’s ability but their influence can define the overall career of a racehorse. The cost of keeping a racehorse in training is around £25,000 a year, plus you have to buy the hungry beast first. Of course sharing the costs in a syndicate or racing club reduces the outlay.
I was at Lingfield recently when the paying public, the punters, returned through the turnstiles. It was a welcome, but also unnerving, experience following a year of racing behind closed gates. Chatting to punters between, after and during races is one of the many joys of the sport, and on this particular day, Tony Linnett was one of them. He has experienced the peaks and pitfalls of racehorse ownership and written two exceedingly entertaining books about his involvement.
A Year of Free Love (Living the dream of racehorse ownership on a shoestring budget) should be required reading for anyone wishing to become an owner of part, even just a tuft of mane, of a racehorse. Tony, a retired head teacher, and four friends, Peter, Trevor, Patrick and Mick, had 10,000 guineas to spend and with the advice of Newmarket trainer Tom Clover and his wife Jackie, bought a yearling they named, you guessed it, Free Love.
Thus the North South Syndicate was formed, and Linnett skilfully describes the build up to their filly’s eagerly awaited debut – and the deflated balloon sensation when she trailed in 28 lengths last of eight on her debut at Kempton on May 1, 2018. Optimism becomes an essential element in the syndicate’s fading dream as Free Love takes her time in allowing the fateful penny to drop. But four months later and eighth time lucky, she scorches home to win by half a length at Catterick, and in a flash all the anguish, expense and disappointment are washed away as the dream is renewed. Free Love is a winner.
And I am delighted to report that three years down that rocky road,
both Free Love and The North South Syndicate are still going strong. Now trained by Mick Appleby, Free Love has now won four races and finished in the money eleven times and I’m sure given ‘the lads’ the rollercoaster ride of their lives. First time out in 2021 she finished second in a Windsor Sprint Series Qualifier and I’ll be following her progress – and her official rating (currently 80) – on my Tracker. Tony Linnett’s follow up, Another Year of Free Love was an entry in William Hill’s Sports Book of the Year, and your favourite search engine will guide you to where they can be purchased.
Returning briefly to handicapping, another horse I am going to add to my Tracker is CAPTAIN TOM CAT, trained by Dr Richard Newland. His exciting novice chaser looks an ideal test bed to judge whether the handicapper has been over harsh (or lenient). I bumped into the (very) good doctor at Worcester a fortnight after CAPTAIN TOM CAT had won his second race over fences.
He had previously jumped superbly on his chasing debut to win impressively at Aintree in mid-May. He followed up with a somewhat hollow victory at Worcester in a four-runner race where the Nicky Henderson-trained second favourite capsised two fences from home. As Dr Newland told me, “It was a nothing race but the handicapper put him up another 7 pounds, and that’s after raising him 12 pounds after Aintree.” Proof of this particular pudding will be to observe what happens next.
Dr Newland mentioned Market Rasen’s Summer Plate on July 17 as a possible target, “or we may wait for a race at Cheltenham’s October meeting.” The Summer Plate has brought plenty of joy to Pembrokeshire trainer Peter Bowen; he’s won the prestigious 2 ¾ mile chase an impressive five times and it looks as if EQUUS DANCER will be lining up this year. I was witness to his latest victory in a novices’ hurdle at Ffos Las, a so-called tune up over smaller obstacles prior to the big one. Firm ground eliminated three of his four rivals with MASTER OF SPIN returning from a break of 467 days his sole adversary. As it turned out, EQUUS DANCER was probably the most unimpressive 33-1 on (that’s 33 to win one!) winner I have ever seen, scrambling to victory by a couple of lengths, however in a ‘proper’ race and back over fences he will be a very different proposition. He won over course and distance in April and looks a leading contender for another Bowen victory.
Royal Ascot has been and gone and the summer bandwagon now shifts to Newmarket’s July Meeting, without doubt my favourite Flat meeting of the year. As a youngster (yes, I was once) my father and I attended without fail, he driving of course. And then, the roles (but not the car) were reversed when I would treat him to this grand day out. I got the best of the bargain as he used to give me £6 (£1 per race) to make my fortune but possibly due to inflation and frugality I failed to repay the compliment. And now with my father no longer around, my brother has in recent years taken an increasing interest in racing, and he now makes the annual pilgrimage to Newmarket, and I join him whenever possible. The magic of the July course never fades.
If the main protagonists stand their ground, this year’s renewal of the July Cup will be a race to savour. Whatever the weather, I want to be there. The reigning champion OXTED, returned to form with a vengeance at Ascot and my (index linked) pound would be on Roger Teal’s star sprinter this time around. The night before the King’s Stand Stakes I was on Sky Sports Racing reporting vigil at Windsor, and two of Oxted’s owner/breeders Tony Hirschfield and Steve Piper were in attendance to watch their star’s full brother CHIPSTEAD finish second in a six furlong handicap. Hirschfield reflecting on last year’s July Cup said, “It was the absolute pinnacle of my life as an owner and breeder of Oxted to watch him win.” I’m sure more champagne was quaffed at Ascot. It was all round brilliance: from his jockey Ceiren Fallon, trainer Roger Teal plus Harry and Sue, his son and wife, and the entire team at Windsor House Stables in Lambourn. It doesn’t happen often, but there is nothing better than a small yard nailing one of the big pots.
Among OXTED’s opponents could be Sir Michael Stoute’s Diamond Jubilee hero DREAM OF DREAMS and STARMAN who sidestepped that race when the rains arrived. But perhaps the most intriguing runner, and I hope he is supplemented for the July Cup, is Dave Evan’s remarkable gelding ROHAAN who was the most impressive winner of the Wokingham Handicap I’ve ever seen. It’s meant to be one of the most keenly fought handicaps of the year, yet ROHAAN swept from last to first in the style of a still improving superstar.
Only last November, he trailed in 13 lengths behind the winner in a modest novices event at Kempton. At the time rated just 55, he has won seven times since, his rating having more than doubled to 112, with apparently plenty more in the locker. Who’d be a handicapper?