A FEW days away from the desk and it seems that all hell broke loose, with Public Accounts Committee scrutiny both in media and then, unfortunately, in racing too.

When I heard Tubs was getting too much attention, I initially thought ‘Tubs?’, that’s not fair on the young lad!

Much of our TV attention last week was at Royal Ascot followed by Glastonbury over the weekend.

That threw up a strange scenario in that once ‘cool’ Arctic Monkeys, now were not so hot. Rick Astley in his prime was never cool, now he was, and Elton John rocked as he had 35 years ago. Some things change...or some....

Where is this ramble heading, you say. Well, it may be that some things never really change. I had cause to go back many decades this week and while searching through the ancient newspaper archives in our office, I came upon an edition of the Farmer’s Journal from 1956.

Guess what, like the music from four decades ago, not a lot had changed! The unnamed Racing Correspondent in his March 3rd column commented, as any 2023 edition would, on “The Irish Invasion of Cheltenham”.

Famous names

The column for this June week was written after some famous names had just been added to the Epsom and Curragh Derby roll of honour. French-trained Lavandin and Rae Johnstone had won at Epsom for Alec Head and owner Pierre Wertheimer, and Talgo and Manny Mercer had won for Harry Wragg and Gerald Oldham at the Curragh. It noted there was not one English-trained colt or filly in the first three in their Derby or Oaks.

The column was headed “Light glows amber over Irish racing” and asked familiar questions on breeding, on the back of the French success – “are we concentrating too much on sprints, both in breeding and race programmes?” It noted “there is a ready market for good sprinters…. The really wealthy owner is becoming scarce…the man who can afford to keep a large string for the longer distance races…” Sound familiar?

While Royal Ascot was a success, it is the only European racing meeting that attracts international participation. And, looking at the worldwide scene, that is not going to change anytime soon.

Ascot winner Waipiro is off to Hong Kong and doubtless Docklands, among others, will head to Australia. Australia have announced a new A$5 million race bringing the Everest raceday prize money to A$31 million. The world’s best racehorse Equinox will very likely stay at home because of the prize money there. Even tonight’s Grade 1 Stephen Foster Stakes in America, the field of eight contains no stars but six of them have won over a million dollars in prize money. Here, horses of the quality of Paddington and Chaldean have yet to crack £1 million.

The latest entries for the July Cup, two weeks away, number just 19. Picking a random year, Starspangledbanner lined up in a field of 14 on 2010. Muhaarar’s race in 2015 had a field of 15. It’s quite likely to be a single figure field this year. And the market for export is wide open.

On the other hand of course, if we were debating an exodus to America and bad breeding programmes back nearly 70 years ago, we are still here doing the same, perhaps like Elton, all the fads and follies will pass by and we’ll still be standing tall for another 50 years!

AT the time of watching the finish of the Queen Anne Stakes at Royal Ascot, the feeling was that Frankie Dettori was not as strong in the finish on Inspiral as you would hope he would be. One or two more cracks might have been administered? But then, the later analysis showed that he probably realised he was on, or over, the whip use limit and he was duly banned for eight days this week.

The whip bans in the aftermath of Royal Ascot have rightly received critical attention in that for ‘offences’ that were barely apparent to any viewers, and the Eclipse and Newmarket July meeting lose out with Frankie and Oisin Murphy on the sidelines.

The only thing to add in favour is that, over jumps, while there were bans after Cheltenham, there were very few whip offences at Aintree, just three, and just one for a British rider, so the argument could be that the sanctions, rightly or wrongly, did have the desired effect of change.

AIDAN O’Brien has had two “incredible” horses this year, so far, and tomorrow Auguste Rodin bids to become more incredible than Paddington when he attempts to follow up his fine Epsom success at the Curragh.

A total of 18 horses have completed the English-Irish Derby double, the most recent being Harzand in 2016. Aidan O’Brien has trained 14 winners to date but only four dual Derby winners.

The Epsom form has been boosted by King Of Steel’s win in the King Edward Stakes at Royal Ascot. The biggest dangers again appear to be the third and fourth from Epsom.

The Curragh should suit White Birch better and connections have reportedly worked on his behaviour at the start. However, he was slowly away at Epsom and ran the first four furlongs in 58.23secs to Auguste Rodin’s 57.76 but he did not really pull back much on the winner over the final furlongs - for the last three furlongs, Auguste ran in 33.01 to White Birch’s 33.25sec, so the O’Brien colt may have his measure again.

Sprewell looked more inconvenienced by interference in the straight and then asked to quicken in chase of King Of Steel. He may well be more suited to the Curragh and have a bit more class than White Birch, for all that, he has his stamina still to prove.