New kids on the block

HOWEVER, it was not all doom and gloom. The 2019 crop of two-year-olds appeared to be very strong and three of them, at least, seemed well above average.

Gestüt Schlenderhan’s Alson won the top juvenile race at Baden-Baden and then ran an excellent second to Victor Ludorum in the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere before winning the Criterium International by 20 lengths in a match race from Aidan O’Brien’s Armory, who was almost certainly below par. This was the only international Group 1 success for Germany in 2019.

Unfortunately Alson is to be trained by André Fabre next year, as Schlenderhan is closing down its private training centre; most of their horses in training are to stay in Germany, but their best three juveniles, as well as a couple of others, have gone to France, a great loss to the German scene.

The other two top two-year-olds are Wonderful Moon, winner of the late-season Herzog von Ratibor-Rennen by 12 lengths, and Rubaiyat, who defeated Wonderful Moon in the Preis des Winterfavoriten and then ran out an easy winner of an Italian Group 2; both are trained by Henk Grewe.

Training scene

THERE is also a very welcome generational change on the human side as well. For most of this century Peter Schiergen and Andreas Wöhler have dominated the training scene and they are now well into their fifties.

When Marcus Klug, now 43, was appointed the trainer at Röttgen in 2010 he was a relative unknown, but he has since proved his ability over and over again and has been champion trainer four times in the last six years.

But the last two years have also seen the amazing rise of Henk Grewe, who has just turned 37. This year he is champion trainer for the first time, both by number of winners – by a large margin – and by prize-money – by a small margin. He seems certain to be near the top of the tree for some years yet, and he is supported by mainly young – or at least youngish- owners.

The same is true of the jockeys. For the past years Andrasch Starke, Adrie de Vries, Filip Minarik and other 40+ -year-olds have been dominant, but this year we have seen Kazakhstan-born Bauyrzhan Murzabayev, 27, and Maxim Pecheur, 29, at the top of the table. The former has a slight lead at the time of writing and with very little racing left seems almost certain to be crowned champion.

Pecheur – despite his name a native-born German and one of the very few German jockeys of whom that can be said – has also had an excellent season and both are very welcome additions to the scene.

Despite the relatively poor 2019 season there is still reason to be optimistic about the future of German racing.