Our columnist Ed Chamberlin hails the return of Enable, has a 10/1 fancy for Glorious Goodwood and pays tribute to John McCririck in his latest bulletin.
Fireworks at last
Racing needed Enable today.
A low-key Flat season now has the star it badly needed. She’s back and back with a bang.
Frankie Dettori described her as the ‘Queen of racing’ afterwards and I was amazed to hear the Coral-Eclipse was being watched live in 50 countries and on terrestrial TV in Australia for the very first time this afternoon.
She’s a global star, all countries, all challenges, she just wins. And racing needed her now because to date it’s been a Flat campaign, Dettori’s Royal Ascot heroics apart, short on fireworks.
The decent three-year-olds all seem to be housed in Ballydoyle but today felt like lift-off. Enable now heads to the King George at Ascot and, as we broke on ITV, a clash with Aidan O’Brien’s Derby winners Anthony Van Dyck and Sovereign.
From there it’s likely to be the Juddmonte International at York and then onto Paris and a historic bid to win three successive Prix de l’Arc de Triomphes.
I’ve never seen a stampede like it at Sandown to get to the winners’ enclosure immediately after the Coral-Eclipse. It felt like we, on the ITV podium, were standing still among a herd of careering buffalos.
People were high-fiving, kids were on parents shoulders and racing was celebrating her return.
Mojito looks Golden bet
Elsewhere one of the performances of the day was Mojto returning from such a long absence to bolt up in the Coral Challenge. He holds an entry in the Golden Mile at Goodwood and I availed myself of some of the 10/1 on offer straight after we came off air at Sandown.
It’s still available in places and granted a half-decent draw, I can see him going off 3/1 favourite.
I hope that’s the plan for the red-hot William Haggas team. They are the best placer of a racehorse in the business for me and if I had the money I’d love to send them one. You’re getting two trainers for the price of one with Maureen playing a major role in a top-notch team.
But please William, just this once, let me do the planning and send Mojito to Goodwood!
Farewell to Big Mac
Victory for Enable was my number one wish on Saturday but I also wanted to do John McCririck justice with the tributes on ITV.
He was always very kind to me over the years and we seemed to talk more about the woes of our respective football teams, Newcastle and Southampton, than we did racing.
But all of us in this sport owe him a huge debt of gratitude. Over the years you could argue he has engaged more people in horse racing than anyone else of his generation.
Everyone from Manchester to Melbourne knew who the man with the big sideburns was.
RIP John, a colossus of the betting ring. All our thoughts are with Jenny and the family.
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