Stable Lass: riding out and mucking in – tales from a Yorkshire racing yard

Sitting directly in between Middleham and Tupgill Park is Middleham gallops, a world-famous training facility that’s spread across High Moor and Low Moor and has been used for training thoroughbreds since the mid-18th century.

The Low Moor, where we were heading, is the larger of the two moors, with a long stretch of grassland. As well as being used for dog walking it has three different gallops – a seven-furlong all-weather gallop, a three-furlong all-weather gallop and another grass gallop. They’re all unusually bouncy, because the land was used by the army during the war to practise manoeuvres; after the gallops started to sink, they put wooden sleepers down and then covered them with turf.

This turned out to be a blessing in disguise as the gallops drain brilliantly. All are in use six days a week and, for anybody who has a love of both horses and beautiful countryside, there’s no better place on earth.