The early tragedy of the flat season

The Flat season proper has opened with an almighty shock and a cruel tragedy.

First City of Troy, the latest horse to be anointed by the incomparable Aidan O’Brien as the best he has ever trained, flopped like a wet sponge in the 2000 Guineas. Then with Charlie Appleby’s Godolphin team mopping up top races to demonstrate that their comparatively poor 2023 was merely a blip, their Hidden Law passed the post as an impressive three-lengths winner of the Chester Vase. As bookmakers’ fingers flicked laptop keys to instal the Dubawi colt as a new favourite for the Derby, a few yards further on he took a false step and shattered his right foreleg. Within minutes he was euthanised.

These animals are so powerful and yet so fragile and as so often it was John Gosden, one of racing’s proper grown-ups, who explained to TV viewers why it is almost impossible to save a horse’s life in such circumstances. It really is time he was given a knighthood. Lawyers get them as a matter of habit, political party donors buy them, ex-ministers get them as consolation prizes and any decent businessman who has done as much for their industry as John Gosden has done for racing should expect such recognition. Is it just racing’s association with betting which keeps denying its deserving figures such an accolade?

Talking of betting, our winter Twelve to Follow did us proud. Nine of them won races, with Dysart Enos, Kel Du Large and Tellherthename each scoring twice, as did Iberico Lord at 7-1 and 15-2. Victtorino came in at 4-1 and White Rhino at 3-1 while Helnwein waited for the last day of the season on better ground to score at 14-1.