Graham Cunningham racing analysis and comment including York's Ebor Festival

The golden glow of the Tokyo Olympics is fading and the harsher charms of football will soon dominate the sports agenda again. But never fear. York is gearing up for a four-day Games of its own next week and GC is keeping the Olympic theme alive ahead of the Yorkshire Ebor Festival.

Forecast looks bright as Ebor week beckons

Ever get the feeling your relationship with racing isn’t what it was? That the spark doesn’t fire like it used to? And that the one you’ve adored for decades has had some work done and is scouring Tinder for hot new partners?

A certain set of circumstances are necessary to induce such melancholy and they came together neatly towards the end of last week.

It started with an ongoing sense of frustration that small fields – there were fifty races with five runners or fewer last week – are strangling the sport in Britain.

It increased with the feeling that if the jolly team formats adopted by The Racing League and Shergar Cup are the answer then I probably don’t really understand the question.

And it peaked on Saturday when incessant rain and a slew of Haydock non-runners made me swerve a trip to a course that has been one of my sporting haunts for donkey’s years.

But sandwiched in between came a Friday night RTV Haydock shift and a couple of timely reminders that this strange old church is made up of many more parishes than the Craggy Island variant populated by cranky old blokes pining for times gone by.

John Berry’s undiluted love for the game crackled through the screen after Das Kapital doubled his 2021 total under Amy Collier in the opener. And the passion that smaller outfits bring to the sport burned brightly again as Lisa Williamson’s Celerity broke the longest losing streak since Eddie The Eagle under Erika Parkinson half an hour later.

The two wins yielded less than £6,000 in prize money combined but they meant the world to the teams concerned and acted as a welcome boost to the bloke reporting on them.

The weather is picking up as the Yorkshire Ebor Festival looms on the horizon. And, with big crowds ready to flock to the Knavesmire again, it’s time to swipe right and head to York with a renewed spring in the step.

🥇 Medallists primed to peak again

Yorkshire folk love placing their homeland in the Olympic medal table and their premier racecourse adopts a similarly punchy tone with a mahoosive banner which reads “Welcome to Yorkshire, England’s biggest and most magnificent county.”

And so, leaving aside the fact that Lancashire finished nicely ahead of Yorks on the 2021 ladder, it’s interesting to note how leading Ebor week trainers resemble global Olympic players.

• For several reasons, not least his past life in California, John Gosden is the USA. A true world player, though picking targets more carefully nowadays after some change at the top, Big John has collected an impressive 15 Ebor winners – headed by Enable and Roaring Lion -over the last decade. He also has a storied longer-term history but, quietly and with military precision, a key rival has parked his tanks on the Knavesmire lawns.
• 🥇 Leading medal hopes: Mishriff and Stradivarius

• And that someone, doing a fair impression of China’s Olympic juggernaut, is William Haggas. The exiled Yorkie has been in Newmarket for many moons but his White Rose passion is fierce and striking gold during the most important week on home soil is paramount. Never one to celebrate silver or bronze, Haggas has excels with finely tuned athletes who score strongly in all disciplines. No-one can match his record of 18 Ebor winners since 2012 and his 2021 team looks well up to scratch.
• 🥇 Leading medal hopes: Alenquer and Mohaafeth

• Well, someone had to wear the Russian Olympic Committee mantle. And for the purposes of this piece it has to be the bloke who is making the most of his chances after a dodgy former teammate was caught doping. Charlie Appleby took a little while to get into York mode but is right up to speed now and, with ten Ebor Festival scores headed by Ghaiyyath in last year’s Juddmonte International, he heads north again with several gold medal contenders.
• 🥇 Leading medal hope: Kemari heads another strong team

• A dash through Richard Hannon’s Ebor record places him bang in Jamaican territory. History shows you can usually oppose him when the emphasis is on endurance but if the event demands brazen speed it’s a different story altogether. Explosive sprinters like Tiggy Wiggy, Mum’s Tipple and Threat figure among Hannon’s eight Ebor week winners in the last decade. And, with another potent hand of youngsters, further sprint success certainly wouldn’t be a Bolt from the blue.
• 🥇 Leading medal hopes: Lusail, Armor and Gubbass

White Rose set to bloom

Certain patterns are evident from the records of other leading Ebor week handlers. You won’t be surprised to hear Aidan O’Brien’s eight winners since 2012 are dominated by G1 success in the International and Yorkshire Oaks, while Andrew Balding has come on strongly with seven wins in recent years and veterans like Sir Michael Stoute, Saeed Bin Suroor and Dermot Weld have had eight, five and four winners apiece in the last decade.

But what about the host nation, or perhaps we should say host nations given that Yorkshire racing is divided into six or seven influential racing kingdoms?

Ten-year trends show how tough it is for local handlers to keep the southern challenge at bay and Yorkshire trainers account for less than a quarter of around 250 Ebor week winners during that period.

But those same trends show that Yorkshire horses are dangerous in a host of valuable contests, especially over sprint distances, with some familiar faces to the fore.

Leading Nunthorpe hope Winter Power heads Tim Easterby’s 2021 team, while Richard Fahey won the Gimcrack with Sands of Mali in 2017 and will be hoping to repeat the feat next Friday with his Norfolk Stakes winner Perfect Power.

Michael Dods doesn’t quite count as a Yorkie given that his Denton Hall base lies just over the border in County Durham but his Ebor week record is strong with six winners including two Nunthorpes for the mighty Mecca’s Angel.

Mark Johnston’s seven Ebor week winners in the last decade including a customary sprinkling of strong stayers, but two exiled Irishmen have led the Yorkshire charge.

David O’Meara averages a winner a year from his nearby Upper Helmsley base and will have another sizeable team again, while Kevin Ryan’s ten Ebor week winners since 2012 include three Gimcracks (he has four in all) and various other big sprints.

So, what are the key hopes for next week?

First, that the fields for the International and the Yorkshire Oaks hold up and that the ground is suitable for a Stradivarius v Trueshan showdown in the Lonsdale Cup.

Mishriff needs to find something to reverse Coral-Eclipse form with St Mark’s Basilica and, given that he’s done well ridden handily in the past, maybe the Gosden team will consider letting him roll forward in Wednesday’s International Stakes?

Kemari hails from the family of Milan and is progressing fast enough to suggest he might emulate that horse in the Great Voltigeur, while Snowfall is going to be a very short price for Thursday’s Yorkshire Oaks unless Wonderful Tonight turns up.

Punting plans for the week will take time to finalise but, Lord forgive me, I’m warming to a horse who once lost 20 on on the trot for the Nunthorpe.

Arecibo isn’t as good as Suesa, Golden Pal and Dragon Symbol if ratings are to be believed, but what if Friday’s feature turns into a molten burnup like the one that enabled him to run a career-best second in Oxted’s King’s Stand?

Robert Cowell’s gelding has got close to the front too soon twice since Royal Ascot but he’s almost certainly still in fine form. Golden Pal, Winter Power and Bedford Flyer will ensure a fierce pace this time and Arecibo could prove a live one at a price if J Spencer reverts to the ultra-patient style he adopted on Kyllachy in this race way back in 2002.

Chapman dodges trouble as Shergar shot misfires

What would be the reaction if an Olympics presenter introduced Mo Farah and joked that his African origins meant he was brought up with monkeys?

You wouldn’t bank on said presenter lasting long but racing seems to operate in a wider lane and Matt Chapman’s ham-fisted introduction of Sean Levey at the Shergar Cup opening ceremony seems to have been passed off merely as ‘Chappers being Chappers.’

Like many a populist before him, Matt uses an artful variation on the ‘PC brigade are out to get me’ theme when it suits. And so, before the Pro Chappers Brigade rear up, let me make it clear that I don’t think he meant anything other than to snare a cheap laugh.

But the list of TV gasbags who have found that cheap laughs can come at a heavy price nowadays is lengthy. And Matt is surely bright enough to know that he dodged a bullet in making his tone-deaf crack over the Ascot PA system rather than during ITV’s afternoon coverage.

Do we need to talk about Aidan?

All major yards go through quiet spells but the O’Brien team haven’t been connecting at their usual impressive strike rate for a few weeks now.

True, Mother Earth snagged another big one at Deauville but it’s been slim pickings otherwise and the only winner Aidan has saddled on home soil in recent weeks was the one handed to him by the Galway stewards because the horse who passed the post first was an older filly who should have been running later on the card.

Normal service could easily be resumed at Leopardstown and the Curragh over the next few days. But, with St Mark’s Basilica and Snowfall heading to York, it’s an interesting subplot to the Ebor Festival preparations.

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