Seven Days

Respect. It really is that simple. If we want to be involved with horses in sport we must treat those animals who give us either our pleasure or livelihood - or both - with decency and dignity. There are rogue elements, of course, but it is how the majority of people involved in horseracing feel and act, be they breeders, owners, trainers, jockeys or fans. Perhaps the most touching embodiment of this was witnessed during a recent visit to Sapporo racecourse in Japan, where there is a shrine alongside the...

'If Carslberg did weekends' was the caption on Tom Marquand's social media post beneath a photograph of the jockey with his wife, Hollie Doyle, after she had won her second Group 1 of the year aboard Bradsell (GB) (Tasleet {GB}). Marquand had himself lifted both of Leopardstown's Group 1 races the previous day with two of the best three-year-olds currently in training, Economics (GB) (Night Of Thunder {Ire}) and Porta Fortuna (Ire) (Caravaggio). Their mantelpiece may soon need reinforcement.  There are few sports in which men and women take each...

It's been a while, hasn't it? We can only apologise for the onslaught of the sales and some extra international travel pushing the Seven Days beat on to the back-burner, but we're home now, almost jetlag-free, and ready for this week's round-up. Quite a lot of Sunday mornings are spent trudging along the Devil's Dyke which separates Newmarket's Rowley Mile from the July Course. The dogs love it, but this walker felt a little wearier this past weekend at the thought that we've now switched back to the Rowley Mile...

At the risk of making anyone who knows me choke on their cornflakes upon reading this, I'm rather enjoying the big sprint races this year. The rivalry between Big Evs (Ire) (Blue Point {Ire}) and Asfoora (Aus) (Flying Artie {Aus}) now stands at honours even, though it was hard not to feel that Asfoora was a little hard done by when Live In The Dream (Ire) (Prince Of Lir {Ire}) edged left just at the moment the Australian was launching her challenge down the stands' side in the G2 King...

Goodwood, UK -- In a near-repeat performance of last year, a Mick Appleby-trained 'Big' horse by a first-season sire, running in the red and blue silks of Paul and Rachael Teasdale's RP Racing Ltd, scorched to success in the G3 Molecomb Stakes.  What came next for Big Evs (Ire) (Blue Point {Ire}) was several victories moving up through the grades and rounding off his juvenile season in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint. It is a pretty safe bet that with each new victory came larger and larger offers...

It's not easy to write a column while watching the Olympics, especially as Britain attempts to out-battle France for eventing gold at the Palace of Versailles, but here goes. It was France which had the upper hand at Ascot on Saturday or, correctly speaking, Francis-Henri Graffard, whose return from Chantilly to the Berkshire track with the rampaging Goliath (Ger) (Adlerflug {Ger}) should have been eye-popping enough to ensure that his runners are never again sent off at such generous odds in Britain. We can now savour the prospect of once...

Seventy years ago, Queen Elizabeth II won the fourth running of the race named in honour of her parents, the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, at her own racecourse, Ascot. Aureole was a hugely appropriate winner, having been bred by King George VI in 1950, two years prior to the monarch's death. The horse's victory was widely welcomed, not least because he had been beaten a year earlier by his conqueror in the Derby, Pinza.  The 'King George' provides ones of the key pivot points in the season,...

This past week the racing has come a distant second in the minds of many when set against the tragedy that has befallen the family of racing commentator John Hunt. Such an appalling act of cruelty is impossible to contemplate, especially when it concerns someone who is so popular and respected. In any workplace there are divisions and squabbles. What unites the racing press room in Britain is the unquestionable fact that John is not only a talented professional but a thoroughly decent man; a friend to so many.  He...

It's all about Camelot really, isn't it? Twelve years on and some of us are still not over him being denied the Triple Crown, but every new Group 1 winner he sires helps to ease the pain a little.  Though this column doesn't like to hear a word against him, it is fair to say that Camelot has his detractors. His latest Classic winner Los Angeles (Ire) doesn't look the most relaxed of horses but once the colt's mind is engaged in his primary job of galloping then it is...

Royal Ascot was tremendous in myriad ways. Sun up, crowd up, and a spread of results which drew in some of the world's biggest owners and trainers alongside syndicates and smaller yards. Then on Sunday morning came the news that QIPCO is to significantly reduce its sponsorship of British racing from next year. British Champions Day will still be run in its name, and the company owned by Sheikhs Hamad and Fahad Al Thani will remain as an official partner of Ascot racecourse, but Newmarket's Guineas meeting, Ascot's King George...

Outside the racing world it was impossible not to be moved over the last week by the commemorative ceremonies marking the 80th anniversary of D-Day. Plenty of people in the bloodstock business will be familiar with the lovely countryside around Deauville, best known to us as home to France's Thoroughbred breeding heartland. The serenity of rural Normandy makes it hard to comprehend the appalling ravages of war that were played out there on the beaches and in the bocage all those decades ago.  I would urge anyone who is a...

On the 15th anniversary of the passing of Vincent O'Brien, his successor at Ballydoyle, Aidan O'Brien, extended his record at Epsom to 10 wins in the Derby. Vincent O'Brien's daughter and son-in-law Sue and John Magnier were not at Epsom on Saturday but several of the late, great trainer's grandchildren were in the winner's circle to greet City Of Troy. Their own family is now so strongly enmeshed with the man who shares their grandfather's surname but is no relation to the creator of Ballydoyle. Just like City Of Troy,...