In Competition No. 2894 you were invited to submit a paean to a famous racehorse. Thanks to David Pearn, who suggested what proved to be an excellent competition. P.C. Parrish, Roger Theobald and Peter Goulding impressed, but I could almost hear the thunder of hooves as I read Chris O’Carroll’s bonus-fiver-winning entry. His fellow winners take £25 each.

O equine Nelson, crippled yet victorious,
The bone disease that made your gait laborious
Rendered the glory you achieved more glorious.
You suffered and did not succumb, Red Rum!
 
Great hero of the greatest steeplechase,
Thrice in a five-year span you won the race,
And also finished twice in second place.
Such prowess strikes us dumb, Red Rum, Red Rum!
 
Even abstainers love your ardent spirit.
No fearsome fence could quell your will to clear it.
No mount can match your record nor come near it.
Your hoofbeats drum — Red Rum, Red Rum, Red Rum!
 
Resting in peace at Aintree’s winning post,
Where each year’s champion salutes your ghost,
You are the racing world’s eternal toast —
Red Rum, Red Rum, Red Rum, Red Rum, Red Rum!
Chris O’Carroll
 
Irish eyes were born to sparkle
Having bred that champion Arkle,
Crowned the fastest steeplechaser
Not a rival matched this racer.
 
Lauded as a money-spinner,
Thrice the Cheltenham Gold Cup winner,
Fast and furious, all enthralling,
Never did he look like falling.
 
Winning for his punters riches,
Soaring fences, jumping ditches,
Hailed as poetry in motion,
Arkle earned deserved devotion.
 
Leaping higher, running faster,
Kempton Park would spell disaster,
Injured, bound for cropping clover,
Arkle’s glory days were over.
Alan Millard
 
Others laud the mighty horses who are monarchs of the courses;
And praise their strength, agility and grace,
But I’ll hymn an equine failure who’s a legend in Australia:
He’s the Drongo, and he never won a race.
 
In thirty-seven meetings he took thirty-seven beatings
Though his dam and sire were classier than most;
Any optimistic betting always ended in regretting,
For the Drongo never nosed it to the post.
 
They hired a champion jockey — Bobby Lewis, keen and cocky,
Who rode him till you’d think his lungs would burst.
But as they neared the finish, Bobby felt his hopes diminish —
No, the Drongo never ever came in first.
 
Years later, in the lingo of the land of roo and dingo
‘He’s a drongo’ means ‘That bloke is N.B.G.’
So, though his speed was rotten, though his betters are forgotten,
The Drongo’s won his niche in history.
George Simmers
 
Come punters, bookies, jockeys, round me flock
To hymn the glorious name of Devon Loch,
Whose equine fame shall live for evermore,
For fate’s vicissitudes a metaphor
That shows mankind how simple it can be
To snatch defeat from th’jaws of victory.
On that dark day in 1956
He left, well favour’d, racing o’er the sticks
But with a five-length lead, leapt in the air
Over a fence which sadly was not there,
Came down confused and stumbling withal,
Not grand, nor national, but now proverbial,
Ending the race not first but rather later.
In sorrow wept our dear Regina-Mater,
While Dick, his rider, solemnly took note,
And rode no more, but now of racing wrote.
Brian Murdoch
 
When I was young he was the nonpareil,
The standard of perfection on the track.
He won the Alexandra without fail
Six summers in a row. His name? Brown Jack.
He modestly acknowledged the acclaim:
Soon a biography was on the way;
A handsome locomotive bore his name;
His statue graces Ascot to this day.
 
He had one quirk, though. He would prick his ears
When in the final furlong by the stands
And pause, half turn to greet the punters’ cheers
As though, like royalty, to shake their hands,
Then ease back through the field to take the race
With mastery unsought but never surer.
He had that quality of casual grace
Renaissance princes once called sprezzatura.
Noel Petty
 
The bustling crowds together make their way
To Epsom Downs that fateful summer day.
In Pathé’s newsreel curious heads stare out,
Moustachioed policemen, fatherly and stout.
And in cortège the royal coach drives through,
Its occupants obscured from public view.
 
The race starts and, careering at a rate,
Round Tattenham Corner, to the final straight
The runners come, when quickly on the course
A shape appears, colliding with a horse.
 
Brave Anmer, steadfast son of Norfolk forge,
So proud to bear the colours of King George,
Selected as a symbol of the State,
Unwittingly to seal a martyr’s fate.
No punter’s nag, no favourite at the Tote,
You helped to win proud womanhood the vote.
Philip Machin

No. 2897: gizza job

You are invited to submit a job application (for a position of your choosing) by a well-known writer, living or dead. Email entries of up to 150 words or 16 lines to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 6 May.