Horse racing
Five little words that signify catastrophe
Darcy trod on a screw. Five little words which, if Darcy was anything other than a thoroughbred horse, might signify…
The second-best jump jockey ever finally gets to finish first
Richard Johnson, possibly the nicest man to occupy a saddle and certainly the most modest, once said of his Irish…
Hot tips for next month’s Cheltenham Festival
Racing Life is all about judgment and I got one thing right at Cheltenham last Saturday after the overnight rain.…
Wear The Fox Hat looks innocent enough but try saying it in an Irish accent
President Lyndon B. Johnson’s image never quite recovered in many people’s view from the photograph of him picking up his…
If there were bones sticking out, I’m out — midlife crisis or no midlife crisis
‘This is a two Voltarol day,’ I thought, as I popped another pill and settled into the bath after Darcy’s…
The joys of jump racing
Thank God for jump racing. The Flat has its glitz and speed and glamour, and we could not help but…
Be warned: the mighty Air Force Blue blows away all before him
I was both delighted and unsurprised that Denis Healey made it to 98. One day in the 1970s I took…
From Darcy's first gallop, I was addicted to speed
The young lad behind the counter of the betting shop looked at me askance. ‘This horse is 200–1.’ ‘Yes. I…
I rode my own racehorse and was changed for ever
‘The last owner who tried to ride his own horse got tanked,’ said the trainer, looking up at me as…
The rewards for breaking rules of horse-racing have to stop
One of Alan Bennett’s characters once lamented, ‘We tried to set up a small anarchist community …but people wouldn’t obey…
It's scary what it takes to be (and stay) a jockey
It’s a tough old business, this racing. Hayley Turner is the best woman rider we’ve ever seen in this country.…
Palio exposes the bribery and violence that lies at the heart of Siena’s lawless ritual
Siena’s Palio is steeped in violence, bribery and corruption. But it matters to its people more than anything, says Jasper Rees
Siena shows that northern Italy is just better at getting drunk
The Indian summer was still fending off the mists and mellow fruitfulness. But the autumn term was about to begin;…
The man who takes the stress out of training horses
For all their formidable physical presence, racehorses spook easily. A sudden gust of wind flapping a plastic sack, a page…
Welcome to Miliband country: how Labour would wreck rural life
A ‘progressive alliance’ would be a profound threat to rural life
Do Scots really die that much younger?
The Scottish way of death Nicola Sturgeon said the SNP would block a rise in the state pension age on…
Sam Waley-Cohen’s Grand National notebook
‘How’s your shoulder?’ someone asked recently, and it was only then I realised, for the first time in a while,…
Horse racing, Sancerre and escaped lobsters
A stint in dry dock — the ‘dry’ literally — has one advantage. There is time for lots of long…
