Marten Julian’s Weekly Roundup 14 September 2026

I used to love ante-post betting.

It was one of the perks of holding a press badge because, if you were working on the track, you had access to the prices offered by the bookmakers’ representatives, clustered around the connections, as soon as they issued the slips revealing their latest odds.

Given one’s status in the industry, and the bookmakers’ desire to ensure their firm’s profile in the next day’s papers, members of the press were seldom, if ever, ‘knocked back’.

So, those of us who were new to the game – and I’m going back to the mid-70s – got an early look at the bets struck by those with close affiliations to certain yards or the respected judges.

I usually relied on my own judgement but I recall ‘following in’, as we called it, the late Graham Rock on Erhaab after that horse won the Dante Stakes at York in 1994.

Graham, then one of the shrewdest judges in the business, told me in hushed tones as the colt returned to the winner’s enclosure, that “it would take an act of God” to keep him out of the frame in the Derby.

We got 100/8 in old money, each-way with Wally Pyrah of Corals, about the eventual 7/2 chance.

This may be a case of confirmation bias but ante-post betting seemed so much more straightforward then. I speak as a man who endured some very unfortunate near misses … I had 25/1 with William Hill about Dancing Brave and 10/1 for El Gran Senor in their Derbys … but the best was a modest win interest on Doyoun for the 2000 Guineas in 1998.

In those days I used to chat to trainers on a regular basis for my Dark Horses work and Michael Stoute, long before he was ennobled, was always willing to share his thoughts with me.

It was around the previous summer when discussing his two-year-olds that he told me “the Mill Reef colt out of Dumka, that’s the one.”

The colt was then unnamed and so it was that I struck a bet with Mecca Bookmakers on an unnamed colt by Mill Reef out of Dumka at 40/1 for the following season’s 2000 Guineas.

As it was important for me to keep ahead of the action, I paid very close attention to the early entries for the top juvenile races, as indeed I still do.

It seemed much easier back then, whereas I defy anyone to have had the winners of this year’s Derby, Oaks or St Leger pencilled in before the start of the season.

I doubt even their connections would have put forward Christmas Day, Thundering On or Highwayman as possible contenders back in the spring.

Highwayman’s rapid rise through the ranks must rate him amongst the most unpredictable Classic winners.

After three relatively quick runs in maidens over 7f, an extended 6f and a mile, it looked as if handicaps were the plan.

After the assessor then declined to allocate the colt a rating, he caught the eye in his fourth outing over a mile at Naas in June, where he came with a late rattle inside the final furlong to finish four and a half lengths behind the winner.

He was given a rating of 76 and handicaps looked the obvious way forward but Joseph O’Brien is no slave to convention and he instead opted for an extended 1m 3f median auction contest at Killarney, which he won by nine lengths.

Raised to 93, he then won the 1m 6f Listed Vinnie Roe Stakes from Cannes, who was rated 95, and Piazza San Marco, who was rated 105, which resulted in his mark being raised to 101.

He came into Saturday’s St Leger as the second lowest rated horse in the field, 17lbs adrift of top-rated Derby winner Christmas Day.

Apart from the colt’s remarkable emergence from the shadows, it’s very rare to see a top race, let alone a Classic, won by a horse who pulled so hard in the first half-mile of the race. His inexperience, at a competitive level, was also evident once he was clear, hanging to the right inside the final furlong.

Now rated on 117, Highwayman may be one of 10 horses his trainer will aim at the Melbourne Cup on November 3^rd. As for the longer term, the son of Persian King still has the physical and mental scope to improve further.

He could not be in a better yard to optimise his potential on the world stage.

Finally, regarding Aidan O’Brien’s revelation that there had been a low-grade infection running through his horses for “the last two months, or a little more”, I repeat what I’ve said many times in the past.

What can possibly be lost by declaring this concern earlier?

We all saw that several of his horses had been underperforming and it would be far easier to handle a defeat in the post-race interview than offer a litany of excuses about tactics, the ground, or the training programme.

A virus would have less impact on a horse’s commercial paddock value but, in fairness, he is in a far from enviable position and I’ve never doubted that Aidan O’Brien is trying to cover every possibility in his post-race interviews.

Over and above his achievements when they are recorded in the annals of the turf, history has shown that no legacy is as rich as honesty.

Bye for now

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