Monday Musings: Newmarket 875

If you arrange an outdoor promotional event in Newmarket in the summer, the morning of the July Cup, you would think, would be the ideal time, writes Tony Stafford. Judging by the light summer dresses and shirtsleeves on view in the High Street earlier on Saturday morning, the decision by Hanako and Roger Varian to launch Hanako’s luxury new fashion brand Newmarket 875 at Carlburg stables in Bury Road that morning was perfectly logical.

The July meeting 2022 had been conducted in the middle of one of the many heatwaves of last summer. By contrast, last week thunderstorms randomly struck all over the country, but as I drove up to the yard the weather was clear and l was just able to sneak a last spot in the car park.

The sun was still making an appearance, but as I approached the marquee where Hanako was steeling herself to address her audience, suddenly the heavens opened. Within seconds, a torrential downpour had stable and catering staff scrambling to close any possible ingress from the elements, while the brand founder fluently delivered her reasons for the creation of her project.

Hanako explained that from the age of 14 back home in Japan, she had been involved with horses, riding as a show jumper. At 18 she decided to come to England, aiming to develop her skill with the animals she loved. Over the last 25 years, latterly married to one of the world’s leading trainers, she has been closely involved, observing horse racing all over the world.

Her conclusion of that lengthy experience is that this is a pivotal time for horse racing. American racing, she says, is suffering from drug and medication issues. UK and Irish racing have funding issues and are also hampered by a declining work force, while France, despite boasting the best prizemoney in Europe, finds it difficult to attract domestic owners.

It was almost with embarrassment that she concluded that the only country where racing is thriving is her homeland. Prize money is in a level of its own and their home-bred horses are more than a match for any from the remaining principal racing and breeding locations. The Varians had a lightning trip last week to the northernmost Japanese island of Hokkaido, home of the famed Shadai and Northern stud farms.

On Monday and Tuesday, Japan’s Select yearling and foal sales were staged and up to 1,000 registered buyers were attempting to secure one of these potentially top-class animals, yearlings on Monday and foals on Tuesday. Each would-be bidder was required to have his finances in place beforehand, so there would be no chance of a repeat of the embarrassing and much-publicised non-payment issues that befell Tattersalls last year.

Roger Varian said: “It was my first time at the sale, although I have been to Japan around a dozen times before. The yearling sale was not unlike Tattersalls, except that the lots were easier to find, ranged in a near numerical order rather than randomly all around the sale.

“The foal sale on Tuesday was very different. Around 250 were catalogued, and each stood with its mother, loosely in numerical order. More astute buyers had the chance to view the respective foals’ sires at the nearby stud farms beforehand. Then, by looking at the mare and foal together, they could get a good idea of how that foal might develop physically,” he said.

Back home in Newmarket, Hanako has, with designer Joe Baker, developed a high-end clothing range with a Newmarket theme, along with luxury accessories, aimed to reflect the glamorous nature of horse racing and breeding in the town.

Examples of the beautifully crafted shirts and other clothing items were ranged around the marquee, interspersed with some imaginatively designed belts, shoe-horns, handbags and the like, all with a horse theme. Hanako was quick to emphasise how important sustainability has been in the creation of the concept.

It is hoped that Harrods, Selfridges, and other leading stores in the UK will stock Newmarket 875 products, although in the meantime they can be viewed and bought on the website, newmarket875.com. The ambitious project will then be aimed at New York, Paris, and other fashion hotspots around the world. Hanako firmly believes horse racing in the UK has plenty to be proud of and hopes Newmarket 875 will become an emblem of that proud tradition.

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Back down at the July Course, something happened that might well reignite the age-old debate about whether the weight-for-age scale is of relevance in the present day. Framed in the distant past and only minutely modified since, weight for age still stands to tell us when three-year-old, four-year-old and even older horses cease to receive a concession from older generations in such races.

Often, when the three-year-olds keep winning condition races in the middle of the season against their elders, admittedly on a sliding and less generous scale as the year progresses, calls are made for its revision or even removal.

Interestingly, I was told by one emerging trainer a few weeks back that the unraced two-year-old filly he was running that afternoon had worked better than an 86-rated older horse.

I took that to mean a four-year-old – but it could have been a year younger. That said, to achieve that result was astonishing and I’m not sure that the rookie trainer concerned had consulted the scale to get the full implications of the gallop.

Anyway, she won nicely, even though only third in the betting in a field of five behind a previous promising debut runner-up and a penalised previous winner. She is set for a step up in grade next time.

But on Saturday we had a moment when a second run, this time in a Listed contest, Newmarket’s Superlative Stakes, threatens to blow the entire WFA scale into the water.

Once-raced City Of Troy, impressive on debut in a maiden at The Curragh, lined up as a well-backed 4/6 shot for the Coolmore partners, amid concerns that the heavy if intermittent rains of the previous few days, plus the sudden torrent I just avoided up the road at 11 a.m. might have made the ground unsuitable.

But, as Aidan O’Brien chatted with Christy Grassick and Paul Smith along with Ryan Moore beforehand, he said that the ground there was still better than is customary, say, for the National Stakes at The Curragh in September.

Cue relief all round: after all, Aidan has won 11 National Stakes, albeit none of the last six. He’s also behind namesake Vincent who has 15 and gets to have the race named after him nowadays, reasonably enough.

The Superlative Stakes was won with a breathtaking burst of speed by City Of Troy, who after duelling for the lead from the off, was let loose by Ryan coming into the last furlong and a half and stormed – he really did storm, I promise you – to a six and a half length verdict, with daylight second.

Handily, on that card, apart from the six-furlong Group 1 July Cup, won in similarly impressive fashion by Commonwealth Cup winner Shaquille, there were two more seven-furlong contests, both handicaps. The winning time of the Group 1 race was, understandably, the best by a second in relation to standard times, while the three contests over an extra furlong were completed in similar times, all very respectably.

First, there was a three-year-old 0-100 handicap, won nicely by the filly Naomi Lapaglia, carrying 8st 4lb in a time 2.82 seconds above standard. Then came the Superlative and City Of Troy, shouldering 9st 3lb and clocking 0.11 seconds slower.

Finally, the Bunbury Cup, a Heritage Handicap with a storied history, was won by Ralph Beckett’s 6yo Biggles, ridden by Ryan Moore, coming home in a time 0.33 seconds faster than City Of Troy. He, coincidentally, carried the same weight as the, erm, superlative Superlative winner.

I asked a few friends who keep up their interest in racing day to day and they all know a fair bit about the sport and have all gone racing with me many times. The question was: What’s the weight for age between 2yo’s and older horses at 7f in the first half (just) of July. To a man they replied, “About a stone.” I answered that, if that were the case, then to run almost an identical performance to the Bunbury Cup winner would have been meritorious.

The reaction when I told them it was 38lb in the first half of July and 35lb thereafter (8lb less against 3yos), was stunned silence. No doubt the scale is probably a shade outdated. Two-year-olds traditionally had their first chance of a run over seven furlongs in the Chesham Stakes at Royal Ascot. Nowadays a lot more stoutly bred animals are precocious as well and more ready to run over the trip than in earlier days.

But cutting to the chase, that was a monstrous performance. City Of Troy has been allotted an early RPR in the Racing Post, of course always open to alteration and downright fudge, which exceeds that given to Thursday’s fluent Group 2 6f July Stakes winner Jasour, trained by Clive Cox, by 8lb.

Inevitably, thoughts projected to the other track and May next year for City of Troy. Aidan remarked before the race, he hadn’t really thought him a big horse until he stood into him. As he returned to unsaddle, amid the sort of buzz of excitement only rarely experienced on a British racecourse, he seemed to have grown another hand taller!

The best news for the Coolmore boys was that this colt is a son of their unbeaten Triple Crown-winning US-based Ashford stud stallion, Justify. Long-range optimism even for the Derby must be included, too,  with the knowledge that Justify won the 12f Belmont Stakes on the most galloping track in North America after making all the running.

O’Brien and Ryan Moore might have initially found a trip yesterday to France proving frustrating as His Majesty, placed in his last two runs at Group 2, made it a hat-trick in second. But it was another Justify runner, this time four-length Christopher Head filly Ramatuelle, who impressed. After sprinting well clear in City Of Troy fashion in the Prix Robert Papin at Chantilly, she has serious claims of being the best juvenile in France so far this year.

• TS

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