Par for the course: golf widows bet on Aintree payback
Two women who bought a horse to compensate for being alone at weekends stand to win £600,000
By BY 5.25pm today, all being well, two self-proclaimed “golf widows” should be very merry ones as well.
Belinda McClung and Deborah “Debs” Thomson bought a racehorse three years ago to give themselves something to do at weekends while their husbands were enjoying a round.
They purchased One For Arthur for a relatively modest – in horse-racing terms at least – £60,000 and registered their ownership as Two Golf Widows.
Today, One For Arthur, whom they describe as “a great big softie”, will set off in the Grand National at Aintree as one of the favourites.
If the eight-year-old wins, it will represent a victory for “golf widows” everywhere.
Mrs McClung and Miss Thomson will also be £600,000 richer – the money for winning the world’s most famous steeplechase.
“Getting the horse was all a bit of a tongue in cheek,” said Mrs McClung, 45, from Ancrum in the Scottish Borders. “My husband and Deb’s partner are always out on the golf course to- gether, so we thought we’d get a horse. You have to have a partnership name – you can call yourself anything really, but we just decided for a bit of a laugh to call ourselves ‘Two Golf Widows’.
“We didn’t ever think we would have a runner in the National, and now everybody wants to know why we called ourselves that.”
Her husband, Fraser, and Colin Dempster, Miss Thomson’s boyfriend of 20 years, have taken this weekend off from the golf course to be with the women on the big day.
“The boys are having a rare weekend off from golfing. It’s a big thing for them as well.”
Miss Thompson, 46, from Gullane, in East Lothian, told of their anxiety on the eve of the race.
Winning wasn’t everything, she said, but getting their beloved horse back in one piece is. “We’re just hoping he gets home safe,” she said.
Mrs McClung added: “We do get quite nervous – he means a lot to us. It’s not like we are people with 50 horses.”
Trained by Lucinda Russell and ridden by Derek Fox, One For Arthur was priced last night at around 16-1 to win. If the horse succeeds, golf widows everywhere will be cheering it all the way to the winner’s enclosure. Charlie Brooks: Page 17 Bryony Gordon: Page 23 Sport: Special supplement