Trainers and their tongues: my handy guide to what our biggest names really mean
Aidan O'Brien said this week St Mark's Basilica was "possibly the best horse we have ever had in Ballydoyle". That comment is obviously open to interpretation given what's at stake at stud, but you cannot possibly argue he wasn't top class. He won five Group 1s in a row, for goodness' sake, and made mincemeat of Mishriff in the Eclipse. He is up there.
Two extra words would have made the quote perfectly legitimate and nobody would have argued at all – "St Mark's was possibly one of the best horses we have ever had in Ballydoyle". Bingo.
The debate over that particular piece of hyperbole has got me thinking about trainers and their tongues. It has taken me over a decade to get to know all the different dialects so I have compiled a little dictionary with some definitions to help you understand a few important phrases that pop up on a regular basis.
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