As promised.. wet again

Well, a morning spent mostly managing the heavy rain running down the gallop, luckily the newly resurfaced round school has taken the rain brilliantly so a bit of work in there prior to a hack for most of them.  New surface has drained perfectly, becoming a bit of an expert on gallop and arena surfaces, some huge variances in cost, plenty of food for thought given that a second all-weather is in the pipeline.......(or should that be "pipe -dream"?)

The redoubtable Jimmy with another load of "arti-turf"

Becoming quite excited about the prospect of actually having a few runners on Saturday, Lucy in action on the flat again tomorrow at Hamilton, she rides Lillioftheballet for the infamous "Dregs of Humanity" in the 3pm.

Makhzoon at the Tuesday night weigh-in.....

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Sunshine

Just to prove that the sun did shine one day this summer some pictures from Kinneston this morning....

Heading down the gallop, heavy rain forecast tomorrow so Saturday runners did their work today with gallop in good order,  baler in action this afternoon we hope!

Milling around, Little Glenshee and Spinning Away watch them turning at the bottom of the gallop

Makhzoon (Lucy) and Northern Flame (Dan)

Up again, The Paddy Premium (Kit) in rear

Tipsy Dara wants to join in.....

Monday

A fine day, decent breeze and sunny spells, drying up, forecast being scrutinized!  A morning on the all weather and riding seven new horses for the first time, all very well behaved which is always a relief, long may it last.  Entries through for Cartmel on Saturday, looks competitive but hopefully we will run Makhzoon, The Paddy Premium and Northern Flame.  One fall and two pulled ups for Lucy at Southwell yesterday, in the circumstances coming home in one piece was a good result, I have never seen horses jump so badly, unedifying stuff and plenty of jockeys including AP took heavy falls, not sure what the problem is but something must be wrong.  Racing then delayed due to ambulance problems; I suspect the racecourse skimping on costs doubt it would have happened at Ascot (or Perth for that matter), 4.40 ended up going off at 6.10. I suspect most of the racegoers had lost the will to live by then, Lucy home very late as a result. Back down the road to Beverley tomorrow where she rides Landesherr for Steve Gollings in the 5.30.

The Paddy Premium

Breezy Sunday

Balwyllo (Holly)

 Cool but a fine south-westerly breeze this morning, beginning to dry things up but forecast not great, two more to Lucinda's this morning, Balwyllo and Goldtrek, seemed to appreciate the change in scenery, both of course were due to run at Perth today.  Back here all on the walker and out for a spell in the paddocks, few mud fever type issues to deal with, never seen the gateways as wet at this time of year.  Plenty to catch up on in the office this morning before an afternoon watching Lucy at Southwell with Mrs A in her familiar position behind the sofa, been most relaxing not having her riding for a couple of weeks, not that she would see it that way!

Goldtrek

Back to the blog...

Well, a special week away from the rain in Majorca, persuaded Lucy to join us from Sunday so whole family assembled for five days, perfect weather and lots of laughs.  Normally my absence is the trigger for the sun to come out here, not this time and conditions have continued to be appalling, whole farm is sodden and  showers again this morning, racing abandoned from Perth to Salisbury and heavy ground for the July Cup at Newmarket - a drought in the Hebrides however, difficult to comprehend. 

Perth Racecourse earlier this week...............

Straight back into the swing of things and Northern Flame, Makhzoon and The Paddy Premium all away for some work on Lucinda's woodchip this morning, Lucy diverted from Perth to Southwell tomorrow where she rides Pete in the 2.10, Secret Desert in the 2.40 and Ocean Bluff in the 4.40.
The girls have done a marvellous job while I have been away - the yard is in good shape and the horses look well.  Although we only have five horses in full work at present there are about a dozen others on an interim regime of being on the walker, in the barns and out in the field so there is a huge amount of to-ing and fro-ing, picking feet, changing rugs etc.  Amidst all of this all of the boxes have been steam-cleaned and repainted (thank you Scott!).  Some of the more major works have been held up by the weather but so far the round school has been completely resurfaced, work to the main school and the all-weather awaits together with a new track connecting the two and six new stables scheduled to be started on Monday; in the office we are trialing new stable management software and we hope to be launching a new website in early August.  Making haylage is also a serious priority and we badly need a window in the weather in the next two weeks or the grass will start to lose nutritional value; we will start riding more on Monday and bring another half dozen in from the fields, hopefully we might actually have some runners at Cartmel next weekend..... I highlighted the paucity of fixtures in the North during the summer recently, three abandonment's at Perth has accentuated the situation and we will be petitioning hard for a couple of replacement fixtures.

Spinning Away

So, two days of Perth abandoned, racing in Wales abandoned, heavy ground from Brighton to Hamilton, the Game Fair abandoned but it doesn't look like anything will stop T in the Park, a sea of mud already but it won't stop the party.
It almost feels appropriate that Perth has been cancelled this week, amidst the gloom of perpetual low cloud and rain there has been an almost tangible air of shared sadness among the Scottish jump racing community for the last week.  It feels better that everyone should have had the chance to grieve and celebrate a rare talent at Campbell Gillies's funeral on Friday before the circuit resumes.  Sometimes it feels a little glib when we say that the Northern jump racing scene is a close community, this tragedy brings a glimmer of hope in demonstrating what a genuine community it really is; regrettably I won't be there on Friday as we have longstanding holiday commitments that have proved too complex to adjust, the yard will be well represented and wherever we are at noon on Friday we will pause for a moment.

Campbell (right) is the first to congratulate Lucy after her inaugural winner against the professionals back in 2010  

One or two people have asked me where the name Buffalo Ballet came from, it's a rather melancholic but beautiful song by John Cale.  For a little while now I have been trying to think of a name for his 4yo sister by Alflora;  I have decided to call her Spinning Away, another wonderful John Cale song that happened to pop up on my iPod last week.  She is an exceptional horse, probably the nicest I have bred, and she is a particular favourite of two of Campbell's best friends, Pete and Dan, the latter of whom has done much of the work with her; so I name her for him, I am sure he would think it is old git's music but there we go. I've just discovered it was originally recorded in 1990 the year of Campbell's birth, try listening to it, give it a couple of goes, it's good...

A couple of this week's intended runners been turned away for a break, we can't keep them going indefinitely if we want them in good heart for next winter, others seem to be working so well that I will hopefully give them a run next week at Perth even if race conditions aren't particularly ideal.  Seven of the horses that were summering (oxymoron?) at Cunnoquhie have come back here and started in light work, we are also bringing half a dozen from here in over the next couple of days, they will spend their time between the barns, the walker and the field.

Rain, rain, rain

Just keeps pouring down, some are much worse off but it is tiresome.  Still difficult to take in the dreadful news from earlier in the week, so many wonderful tributes but such a terrible waste, its going to be tough for lads in the weighing room at Perth next week but I am sure Campbell would have wanted them to crack on and get on with it, a poignant winner for Arlary at Hamilton last night, so pleased for them and am sure they will pull together, incredibly difficult though.

Paddock at Newcastle yesterday afternoon.......

Be nice if it dries out a bit for Perth, we have five entered but they could all do with reasonable ground, meanwhile I am going to make a fleeting visit to Musselburgh this afternoon to watch Lucy ride Illustration in the 4.20 and Stormont Bridge in the 4.55 - both outsiders but riding on the flat is keeping her very fit (and light!).
Goodness gracious me, the sun has just come out, I must be hallucinating...........