Saturday February 28, 2015.

 

 

INTERNATIONAL HORSERACING 

Racing Right Global Equus Zone (GB)

Your adventure into the world of Global Horseracing

a warm welcome to  

Nicholas Godfrey (GB) (Racing Post)

http://www.racingpost.
http://www.dubaiworldcup.com/race/racing-info/entries
 

COUNTDOWN TO CHELTENHAM 2015
Kim Bailey CH4 Morning Line Guest last Saturday.
 Nicholas Godfrey talks to Kim Bailey and Norman Williamson, who combined 20 years ago for a rare double in the Cheltenham Gold Cup and Champion Hurdle brought us a feature in the Racing Post on Thursday this week page 8-9:
 

FESTIVAL MEMORIES

ALDERBROOK AND MASTER OATS

"Kim Bailey and Norman Williams 20 years on from their remarkable double. "

http://www.racingpost.com/horses/trainer_home.sd?trainer_id=695#topTrainerTabs=trainer_record_race_form&bottomTrainerTabs=trainer_big_race_wins
 

"Conquering heroes relive golden years."
http://www.kimbaileyracing.com/baileys-blog/

Kim says: "The extraordinary thing is you look back 20 years and think how much you'd love to have another week like that. I took so much for granted at the time but how lucky was I to go there with two horses who had everything going for them - they wanted soft ground, they got soft ground - and a faultless preparation.

 

"Just imagine that, " the trainer goes on, almost incredulous . Having two horses that you know in your mind that you've got cherry ripe, and you've got the conditions, the lot. Soft ground doesn't happen at Cheltenham very often and there we had two soft-ground horses and we got torrential rain in March. "

 

"Stormin" Norman' Williamson, now 46, can scarcely believe it is 20 years ago,. "It doesn't feel like it to me, " he say's, "It feels like five or six years. Can you believe I had never ridden a winner at Cheltenham and Kim had never trained a winner there? "

 

"In 1995 Bailey was at the zenith of his powers at his former Lambourn base; he remains one of just two current trainers to have won the 'big three' jumps races - Mr Frisk having won the Grand National in 1990.

 

 

"I'd had several runners and some near-misses but Cheltenham hadn't been that lucky a place for me, " recalls Bailey, now based just a few miles from the course at Andoversford. "If you don't have a Festival winner everybody talks about it and it does really become a bogey. You begin to believe there is something wrong with you. "

 

"The two horses that were going to get the  monkey off Bailey's back in such dramatic fashion could have hardly been more different. Master Oats was a failed point-to-pointer who never even ran over hurdles, where as Alderbrook was the ex-flat racer who had won a Group 3 at Goodwood in 1994 for Julie Cecil, before being switched to Bailey four months later by unconventional owner Ernie Pick.

 

"Bailey takes up the story. "Alderbrook was something I never expected to happen, " he says, "I had always specialised in chasers, or thought I did, and I never expected to win a Champion Hurdle. When Ernie Pick suddenly appeared on my doorstep with a horse from Newmarket to go and win a Champion Hurdle ... well frankly I didn't think he knew what he was talking about and didn't think it could ever possibly happen.

 

"The self -effacing trainer has always credited both victories as a massive team effort, also featuring his much-respected assistant Eddie Hales and jumping guru Yogi Breisner, who had his work cut out with the six-year-old Alderbrook, still an entire horse.

 

"I sent him to Yogi before he came to me and Yogi rang me after a week and said 'he can't jump' "says Bailey. "I said: "well you'd better effing well get him to jump!" He carried on and then rang me to say He'd cracked it, which gives you an idea of how good Yogi Breisner is. When Alderbrook schooled over hurdles after that, we stood in absolute awe and amazement ...... "