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DAVID CARR |
Weblog: What do you mean the Wi-Fi doesn't work? The life of a Racing Post reporter
Blowing us back into the 1970s
It may be just three days after Christmas and three days from New Year's Eve but it was the weather that everyone was talking about at Catterick today.
No surprise at a meeting which history suggests is even money to be frozen off - it was lost the last two years and this was only the fifth time it had gone ahead in the past decade.
And there was something for everyone as the runners filed into the paddock for the opener - bright sunshine, driving rain, a beautiful rainbow gleaming over the car park and a fierce wind.
So gusty that for the first time I can ever recall on the racecourse they actually made an announcement saying racegoers should take care in the wind. Which was considerate of them. Good day for nostalgia too.
Ginger Grey won in the colours made famous by Tamalin, the Charlie Hall Chase winner of 1974, half an hour after the latest running of a 3m chase which Red Rum won 40 years ago.
And another name from the 1970s brought to mind was Abednego, thanks to the victory of Shadrack.
One for biblical scholars there as Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were the three men who survived the fiery furnace after being condemned to death by King Nebuchadnezzar - read all about it in the book of Daniel in the Old Testament.
You'd count your blessings if you emerged unscathed from a fiery furnace, as you would after the almost-as-miraculous feat of backing six winners in a day at the Cheltenham Festival.
That was what four friends did one afternoon earlier this century, touching a bin for luck each time - hence 'Lucky Bin Racing', the curious name they chose to commemorate that day when they moved into racehorse ownership.
It doesn't quite roll off the tongue like 'Godolphin' or 'Cheveley Park Stud' but don't knock it - there are plenty more races in their Star In Flight judged on the way he won this afternoon.
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