Not long ago, Katey Kontent finished a very good second at Salisbury. She was carrying 9st 10lbs and was up against colts and geldings so it was a very fair effort. I think of all the people on course and … Read More »

The going at Goodwood has been soft or heavy more often than not this year and nothing changed on their final day in October. You have to make the circumstances work in your favour if possible and that was certainly … Read More »

If I believed in ghosts I might find Islington Green a suitable starting point for a thesis. Trendy, even chic it may be nowadays but in the seventeenth century it was used as a plague pit  –  a little-known fact … Read More »

Like Marcel Proust, I drift back to the places of my youth. Some have disappeared, some have become something else and some are simply too loud. Actually it might be stretching a point to mention my formative years where the … Read More »

The rain falls gently yet insistently on the Nine Elms Tavern which, like the rest of the borough, has undergone something of a transformation. One minute it was Battersea’s little-known cousin  –  nondescript flats, a little bit of this and … Read More »

Gordon Lightfoot died the other day. I dare say only members of my generation will remember him but he was a folk and country singer who let Alberta’s wide-open spaces compensate for disappointments in his personal life. We played him … Read More »

George Materna, a dedicated Goodwood supporter, missed the first Saturday in early May. This was because his second daughter (of five) was having her pre-marriage ‘hen’ do in his box. I was the tipster and the only man there. Needless … Read More »

My Aunt Kate and Uncle Doug lived at 8 Methuen Street in Southampton. They are long gone but, like Marcel Proust, I wander the narrow street now and again. I doubt that Marcel was ever seen in Southampton because he … Read More »

It was hardly the sort of race to fire the imagination so close to Cheltenham but, to my intense satisfaction and a handy profit to boot, Suzi’s Connoisseur went in at 9/1 at Lingfield the other day. He is twelve … Read More »

You can think things through and still make an error of judgement, we all accept that, though how long we think about it afterwards varies from person to person. ‘Tomorrow is another day’ seems to suit many people and I … Read More »