Why the return of French racing is the best news I've had in weeks

Get the bunting out, racing is back. However much longer we must wait for Britain or Ireland to resume, it seems highly likely – we cannot say certain, not in these times – that on Monday Longchamp, Toulouse and Compiegne will bring back the sight of horses racing against a backdrop with which many of us will be familiar. There will even be some familiar horses, with any luck, as Earthlight, Victor Ludorum and Sottsass have all appeared in the initial entries at Longchamp.

It is natural to feel a bit of recoil guilt at getting so excited about something so frivolous. These last two months in general have been a harsh tonic for those of us who make our living from promoting a leisure pursuit. But it will be VE Day on Friday, proof that nothing is so grave that its end cannot be celebrated.

At the start of lockdown, it seemed like everyone who was able to ignore the ominous plume that sat above our heads like cigarette smoke in a pub was pledging to learn a new language. You have to admire the capacity for self-distraction, and I admit to having built up a few more XPs on Duolingo than might otherwise have been the case, but the real quiet ambition was to become conversant in the racing language of another country.