Aintree People Race loses its innocence. Within the rebranding research being conducted for British racing, one intriguing question is whether the sport can be popularised by the rampant appetite for participant reality television. The answer, given the modern paranoias about health and safety and animal welfare, is almost certainly not. Yet the reaction to Anthony Knott’s surreal winner at Wincanton last week shows what can be achieved.

Knott, for those still unfamiliar with the tale, is a gap-toothed Dorset dairy farmer who had endured 28 barren years as an amateur jockey before registering his first win – and celebrating it by waving wildly to his agricultural mates in the crowd before riding the final furlong like a bareback cowhand.

It was fairytale viewing – especially when Knott, 44, revealed that his routine day starts at 3.30am with the milking of 260 cows and includes two sessions on a mechanical horse, 50 lengths of a local swimming pool and an evening ballroom dancing with his wife.

Perhaps he slipped that in to attract an audition for Strictly Come Dancing. But it added to this homely Corinthian victory. Four days after the event, BBC television devoted the final item of its early-evening news to Knott. Preciously rare, good-news publicity for racing.

The closest approximation of the you can do that opportunity that racing seeks has been the John Smith’s People’s Race, which for the past two years has enabled complete novices to train for the chance to ride Aintree on Grand National day. Diary understands, however, that the innocence has been regretfully eliminated from a contest as high on risk as romance.

A guitar instructor broke his arm in the first race and, last April, a woman fitness instructor was concussed by a fall in front of the stands. Trainers and administrators are understandably edgy about the dangers, which has led to a redrawing of eligibility – from now on, only those who have ridden a winner under Rules are prohibited.

There will still be many novices among the 2,000-plus entrants. But the final 30, due to be chosen on December 17, is likely to be dominated by stable staff and point-to-point riders. A shame, certainly, but an accurate gauge of the difficulties in making the public feel they can participate in racing.

Still, some bright folk in racing are exploiting television fashion. Lingfield is aware that its long-standing National Hunt audience is diminished by difficulties identifying the jumps fixtures dotted among a dense volume of Polytrack racing. Hence, it is introducing a jumps-only membership fee of 60 for 2009 and entitled the offer Strictly Come Jumping.

Anticipation is growing in Wales over the prospect of keeping the Coral Welsh National in the country for the first time in more than 40 years. Six Welsh-trained horses feature among 78 entries for the Chepstow marathon on December 27 and the likeliest of them is High Chimes, trained by Evan Williams and first set to run in the Hennessy on Saturday. He would be a highly appropriate horse to break the Welsh famine in their own race. The last home winner was Norther in 1965. Norther had graduated from the Welsh point-to-pointing scene and was ridden to his maiden win, at Pontyrch in 1963, by Williams’s father, Rhys.

British pointing resumes this weekend, with the sport thriving despite exaggerated hand-wringing over the hunting ban. Also in bullish health is the bible of the amateur game, the Hunter Chasers and Point-to-Pointers Annual, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. The latest edition is as entertainingly uninhibited as ever. Take the comments on Was I Right: ..the owner-rider will have plenty of time to ask himself was I right?’ during his spell at Her Majesty’s pleasure for having one too many and then driving several miles north on the southbound carriageway of the A1.

Almost unnoticed, the rules regarding forfeit stages for big races were scrapped last week. Henceforth, trainers can, and should, scratch a definite non-runner as soon as a decision has been taken. So, no further opportunities for Jim Bolger to claim it was a mistake to leave a Derby favourite in the race after insisting he would not run.

Jamaludin wins Churchill Downs feature.
Jamaludin took the lead on the final turn and raced to a 5 1/2 -length win in the $44,620 allowance feature at Churchill Downs on Wednesday.

Ridden by Julien Leparoux, the 4-year-old son of Chester House covered the 1 1/8 miles on the turf in 1:51.72 and paid $6.80, $4.20 and $3.40. Dontwait Toolong returned $9.20 and $5.20, while My Happiness was three-quarters of a length back and paid $6.60.

The win was Jamaludins third in 11 career starts, earning $28,796 to increase his total to $103,755. He is owned by Ken and Sarah Ramsey.

—-
Dewey improves, likely for the Breeders Crown.

Deweycheatumnhowe continues to show improvement from a throat and mouth problem that threatened to knock him out of Saturdays Breeders Crown at the Meadowlands Racetrack.
Were going, driver and trainer Ray Schnittker said on Wednesday. I trained him today and he seemed good. I would say he was about 80 percent better than he was before, so thats a really good sign.

Dewey, a leading contender for Harness Horse of the Year honors, is the 6-5 favorite in the 3-year-old Colt Trot, one of eight Breeders Crowns worth a combined $4.9 million. The Hambletonian winner developed swelling in the mouth and throat last week, jeopardizing his status for the season-ending championships.

There is still a little swelling back under his tongue that is in the way of his airway, Schnittker said. He has stopped the drooling, which is a good thing. We dont know what will happen in the next day or two, but he is feeling good, so were going on.

Deweycheatumnhowe has post No. 8 for his last scheduled start before retirement to stud. He has won 22 of 24 starts in his career.

A Rose for You wins Big A feature. A Rose for You rolled to a front running victory, her third in a row, in the $68,500 Star De Lady Anne Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at Aqueduct.

Trained by Michael Trombetta, A Rose for You was not challenged early, leaving her in command for a 1-length win.

Eibar Coa was aboard as A Rose for You improved to 4-for-11 overall. She ran the six furlongs on the good track in 1:10.91, paying $10.80, $4.20 and $2.90. Ididntmeantoo, the 7-5 favorite, outdueled Honest to Betsy by a neck for second, returning $3.20 and $2.60. Honest to Betsy paid $2.60.

—-
Hold order lifted at Laurel Park barn.

State agriculture officials have lifted a hold order on a Laurel Park barn after all 25 horses there tested negative for neurologic equine herpesvirus in a second round of tests.

Maryland Department of Agriculture officials lifted the order Wednesday, 11 days after the last known viral exposure in the barn.

When a 2-year-old filly in Barn 1 tested positive for EHV-1 on Nov. 12, the Maryland Jockey Club announced no horses would be allowed to ship into Laurel Park except those from the Bowie Training Center. That order was lifted last week, but 60 horses were barred from leaving the grounds until the hold order was lifted.

Barry Geraghty relies on Punjabi to take Fighting Fifth at Newcastle. Barry Geraghty has opted to ride Punjabi at Newcastle in preference to a gilt-edged book of rides for the Nicky Henderson stable at Newbury on Saturday. The Irish jockey has given up at least five rides, among them the fancied mount on Oedipe in the Hennessy Cognac Gold Cup, to partner the horse that carried him into third place in the Champion Hurdle.

Barry had the choice and he has decided to go to Newcastle, Henderson said yesterday. He knows Punjabi so well, having won on him at Punchestown after Cheltenham. Geraghty’s decision has obliged Henderson to find jockeys for Duc De Regniere, Petit Robin, Earth Crystal and Stellino, in addition to Oedipe.

Henderson could be represented in all seven races at Newbury, whereas Punjabi is his sole entry at Newcastle. And while Geraghty’s decision could prove costly, he was doubtless drawn towards the horse who did more than any other to secure him the position as Henderson’s retained jockey.

He first rode Punjabi at Cheltenham after Mick Fitzgerald, whom Geraghty succeeded at Seven Barrows, elected to ride Afsoun. And the combination came good at Punchestown in April when Punjabi bettered Sublimity, who reopposes in the WBX.COM Fighting Fifth Hurdle on Saturday. Cashmans opened their book on the two-mile hurdle yesterday and bet 5-4 Punjabi, 3-1 Harchibald, 9-2 Sublimity, 5-1 Blue Bajan, 12-1 others.
Henderson feels that Punjabi is ready to do himself justice on his seasonal return. There is also the small matter of a 1 million bonus for any horse following up victory at Newcastle by winning the Christmas Hurdle and Champion Hurdle.

Punjabi is much straighter than for his comeback last season, Henderson said. He totally blew up that day but he has done much more work this time. He has been off since we turned him away in June, when he was balloted out at Royal Ascot, but he is going well.

Whatever Punjabi’s fate, Henderson always saddles some of his best young horses at Newbury’s Hennessy meeting. Tony McCoy, active for the stable this season, is an obvious stand-in for Geraghty – although he already has a Hennessy ride in Alberta’s Run.

Henderson landed the Hennessy three years ago with Trabolgan, who has since been detained by tendon trouble. However, the ten-year-old, also winner of the Royal & SunAlliance Chase at Cheltenham, is back in fast work and not far off a return to the fray. Trabolgan worked well this morning, the trainer said, and he will school for the first time on Thursday. We are about to start looking for a race for him and I have put him in the Boylesports Gold Cup .

This year’s Hennessy renewal does not look as competitive as usual after Exotic Dancer’s expected withdrawal on Monday. His defection triggered a 16lb rise in the handicap, which leaves Island Flyer attractively weighted on 10st. Tom George, Island Flyer’s trainer, is expecting a forward showing from the well-backed gelding, who made an encouraging seasonal comeback at Wincanton.

The sharp rise in the weights has also promoted Knowhere to top the handicap jointly with 11st 12lb. Yet Nigel Twiston-Davies, Knowhere’s trainer, is undeterred. Paddy said we should have run Knowhere at Haydock last Saturday, he said. It is an open race and the horse is in the form of his life. Denman won it last year, and while I’m not saying that he’s Denman, Denman showed that topweights can win the race.

Twiston-Davies also saddles Pettifour, his World Hurdle candidate who remains unbeaten over timber, in the toteswinger Long Distance Hurdle on the same Newbury card.

The trainer could hardly have his string in better form. A double at Lingfield yesterday showcased his prowess, with Night Safe defying a 763-day absence to run his rivals ragged in the Burstow Novices’ Chase over three miles. Night Safe has now won four of his six starts, but Twiston-Davies saved his superlatives for Little Josh, who positively sauntered home under Brennan in the Copthorne Novices’ Hurdle over 2 miles.

Paddy was excited by that, the trainer said. He said the horse has so much speed and thinks he could go right to the top. The world is his oyster. Having enriched so many of his owners of late, it was appropriate that Twiston-Davies saw his own silks carried to victory by Little Josh.

6 races bumped to Grade I status in 2009. Two Breeders Cup events were among the six 2009 races elevated to Grade I stakes status by the American Graded Stakes Committee of the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association.

The $1 million Filly and Mare Sprint and $1 million Dirt Mile were upgraded from Grade II to Grade I by the committee, which gave 488 races graded-stakes status next year, an increase of seven.

Others bumped to Grade I were the Jamaica Handicap at Belmont Park, the Pat OBrien and Clement L. Hirsch Handicaps at Del Mar and the Vinery Madison Stakes at Keeneland.

A total of 13 graded races were upgraded, including seven new Grade II races. The committee also gave 10 new races Grade III designations.

The Suburban Handicap at Belmont Park was downgraded from Grade I to Grade II.

Also the Kentucky Derby Trial, which lost its graded stakes status a few years ago, will be a Grade III race next year. The Trial held during the last weekend in April has been a horses last chance to get enough graded-stakes earnings to qualify for the Derby.

Somebeachsomewhere is favorite in Breeders Crown. Somebeachsomewhere is the lowest-priced favorite at 3-5 in the Breeders Crown on Saturday night at the Meadowlands Racetrack.

The eight Breeders Crowns for 2- and 3-year-olds, worth a combined $4.9 million, will determine harness racings divisional champions and the sports biggest price: Horse of the Year.

Somebeachsomewhere can stake a claim to that title with a win in the 3-year-old Colt Pace. He has post No. 3 in the $500,000 race with Paul MacDonell set to drive.

The Beach has won 13 of 14 races this season, with the lone loss coming in a neck defeat at the $1 million Meadowlands Pace in July.

This will be his final start before heading off to stud.

He seems sharp and ready to go, said trainer Brian MacGrath. Were looking forward to his new career. I think he will be a tremendous sire.

Deweycheatumnhowe, the other leading Horse of the Year candidate, has post No. 8 as the 6-5 favorite in the 3-year-old Colt Trot, also worth $500,000 with trainer Ray Schnittker at the lines.

Dewey has been battling a throat abscess discovered last week, raising the possibility he might be scratched from the season-ending championships. The Hambletonian winner has won 22 of 24 races in his career.

Native Bride is the 5-2 choice from post No. 3 in the 3-year-old Filly Pace. She earned her way into the $610,000 final, extending her winning streak to seven in eliminations last week. Brian Sears drives; Jay Sears, his father, is the trainer.

In the 3-year-old Filly Trot, Lantern Kosmos is the 5-2 favorite in the $500,000 final from post No. 8 with John Campbell driving for trainer Jimmy Takter.

The four Breeders Crowns for 2-year-olds are each worth $700,000.

Sears drives three of the favorites: Muscle Hill, 7-5, in the Colt Trot from post No. 2 for trainer Greg Peck; Major In Art, 9-5, in the Colt Pace from the rail for trainer Justin Lebo and Hawaiian Drink, 2-1, for trainer Tracy Brainard from post No. 2 in the Filly Pace.

Campbell steers Honorable Daughter, the 5-2 choice trained by Larry Remmen from post No. 7, in the Filly Trot.

Tote fails to find winning Scoop6 combination.
Of all the running sores afflicting British racing, the Tote has recently been the most embarrassing. Already a shadow of the force a monopoly pool betting organisation should be, its credibility was further humbled by the maladroit meddling of the government in its sale. Still on the market, still imperilled, still punching way below its weight, the Tote needed the publicity of a record Scoop6 pot like an ailing patient needs oxygen.

Indeed, given the attention the potential payout attracted from the front end of newspapers and the curiosity end of TV news bulletins, it was also a considerable windfall for racing – possibly overdue, after almost a decade of this big Saturday bet, but nonetheless welcome.

Certain aspects, though, were imperfect. Just when another Agnes Haddock was needed, the eight winning tickets produced no such romance. Two were held by Harry Findlay, the ebullient epitome of a professional gambler, one by a syndicate of formbook journalists.

The only winner from the 2 lottery-style mentality necessary for appealing follow-ups is held by a man who demands anonymity.

Then there was the make-up of the six races. With the jumps season buzzing, the Tote selected four all-weather races at Lingfield and possibly the worst jumps race of the afternoon at Huntingdon. As Tote sources insist they were under no pressure from Channel 4 – who had none of the best jumps contests to screen – we must assume that it was simply a device to make the bet as difficult as possible.

Commercially, that may have been vindicated. But to showcase the sport still more effectively, one must hope the Tote does not even think beyond the Hennessy for the 1.5 million bonus race this Saturday.

Bowen views Newbury feature for Snoopy Loopy.
Peter Bowen and Nicky Henderson, who between them mopped up half-a-dozen valuable races this weekend, both face dilemmas before the Hennessy Cognac Gold Cup that dominates next Saturday’s action. Bowen must decide whether to send Snoopy Loopy into action one more time, while Henderson has to settle on a jockey for his well-backed candidate, Oedipe.

Bowen enjoyed the biggest success of his inspiring career when Snoopy Loopy won the Betfair Chase on Saturday and he followed up – for the same owner, Dai Walters – with the hurdling victory of Serabad at Aintree yesterday. Not a bad weekend for a man who had previously registered only one winner in seven weeks.

After farming the top summer chases, Snoopy Loopy has maintained relentless progress and Bowen is understandably tempted to turn him out again in the Hennessy. He’ll be nearly top weight, which means he won’t have to carry most of his penalty, he said. There is little else for him until the new year, so he’ll be left in the race and we’ll just see how he is.

Having resumed the handling of most of Walters’ string earlier this month, Bowen plainly has an auspicious hurdler in Serabad and plans to introduce another, in the recently purchased Peppertree Lane, at Newbury this week.

Henderson, whose five winners on Saturday earned him more than 180,000 prize-money, also has a stack of important runners planned for Newbury, which is complicating his decision on the destination of his stable jockey, Barry Geraghty.

Punjabi runs in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle and Barry knows him very well, Henderson explained. But we have Oedipe in the Hennessy and a number of others, like Petit Robin and Duc de Regniere, heading for Newbury. We’ll have to talk about it.

Henderson has trained 19 winners in November and acclaimed Saturday as one of the great days we’ve ever had. Jack The Giant, Chomba Womba and My Petra scored for Geraghty at Ascot and Binocular reinforced his position as Champion Hurdle favourite with a facile win at 1-9 under Tony McCoy at Haydock.

Bookmakers might seem churlish to have cut Binocular for the hurdling crown on the strength of that but his fast, slick hurdling was unarguably striking. In addition, his market rival, Crack Away Jack, was beaten by Chomba Womba. Emma Lavelle, his trainer, must now decide whether to take on Binocular in the Boylesports Hurdle at Cheltenham next month.

Peter Bowen and his young helpers show strength of family values. Two snapshots from Haydock Park on Saturday linger in the mind. The first was in the moments after that stirring end to the Betfair Chase and witnessed the three young sons of Peter Bowen sprinting joyously across the parade ring, with mother Karen somehow keeping pace. The second, an hour later, featured Henrietta Knight looking bewildered and persecuted.

Every trainer suffers downturns but Knight’s is in the severe category. Until yesterday, her last winners – three of them in four days – came in May and the barren spell had acquired the mocking perversities that so often pursue those down on their luck.

Her expression on Saturday had been caused by the fate of two fancied runners. The Vicar cocked his jaw and ran out at Huntingdon, then Glasker Mill was virtually knocked over by an errant rival at Haydock. It was one calamity after another and the losing sequence had stretched to 60 runners, and 179 days, before Cross Kennon won the Ludlow bumper yesterday.

Knight was never going to replace Best Mate but neither has her masterful handling of that late and still mourned hero guaranteed a stable of sufficient quality to maintain her profile. And that is a pity for us all. The delightfully dotty relationship between Knight and Terry Biddlecombe, her husband, combined with the rural splendour of their yard, was a seductive cocktail that carried the story into areas racing usually fails to penetrate.
Just as you cannot create another Best Mate, so it is impossible to replicate the human interests behind him. But here is the link between those Saturday vignettes. With the spiralling success story that is Snoopy Loopy, racing should be making far more of the Welsh family Bowen.

The trainer himself has finally filled his Pembrokeshire yard with competitive horses and Snoopy Loopy, whose prize-money this season already exceeds 220,000, could yet bid for another big purse on Saturday – he was one of 21 left in the Hennessy Cognac Gold Cup yesterday. Ladbrokes quote him at 100-1 for the Gold Cup but, as Bowen has never been a slave to odds or logic, he is likely to end up there, too.

Bowen’s legacy, though, will be more than improbable winners. It will be his own fightback from illness. It will be the stubborn vision that made him stay in a deterringly remote area, where he has been an inspiration to more recently established Welsh trainers such as Evan Williams and Tim Vaughan.

Most of all, though, it should be the dynamic of the family that is celebrated. A magician with horses, Bowen is also, quite plainly, a hero to his three boys, who have become a regular part of the family ensemble as they journey around the country to weekend meetings in the unpretentious accommodation of their horsebox.

Micky is 13, Sean 11 and James 7. The elder two ride out every day before school – Sean is inseparable from Souffleur, runner-up in a 100,000 hurdle at Haydock – while, according to his mother, James spends all his time with his head in the formbooks and programme book.

They arrive at the races in red jackets bearing the admirably inclusive insignia, Peter and Karen Bowen Racing, and the three lads seem utterly content with their parents’ desire to spend their nights away unexotically close to the horses.

Their celebrations of Betfair Chase glory were characteristic. We stayed in the lads’ hostel at Haydock, Bowen reports. Didn’t even go out, it was so cosy there, Karen added contentedly. And I drank nothing but orange juice and lemonade, the trainer declared.

Undemanding, understated and underrated, Bowen is a trainer worth a far wider audience – especially with a racing-mad family that is such a throwback to more innocent times.

Nicholls ponders most trying of weekends as luck deserts Thomas. This time last year, Sam Thomas could have been forgiven for thinking stardom was simply acquired, as his first weekend deputising for an injured Ruby Walsh brought big-race glory twice over. Twelve months on, the same situation, same horses and corresponding races, left him reflecting emptily on the vagaries of jump racing.

Kauto Star is none the worse – in body, if not in reputation – for the spectacular exit of his jockey at the final fence of the Betfair Chase on Saturday. Thomas, implicitly criticised for his tactics on the former champion, was again unseated from Gwanako in the Grand Sefton Chase yesterday before his bid for a Becher Chase double on Mr Pointment withered in the mud of Aintree’s home straight.

Mr Pointment at least completed, an exhausted runner-up to the trailblazing Black Apalachi. Over in Ireland, meanwhile, Officier de Reserve was the casualty of a messy incident in the Troytown Chase at Navan, summing up the suddenly punctured fortunes of the champion trainer, Paul Nicholls.

It’s been a trying weekend, Nicholls conceded in the driving rain of a Liverpool evening. The only good thing is that all the horses are okay. We have to refocus on next weekend now and get everyone thinking positively.

Thomas’s confidence will be a specific concern for Nicholls as the three-day Hennessy meeting looms. The jockey, who handled his sudden elevation so coolly a year ago, will inevitably find it tougher after these events but the trainer put his position into context. I was in a stew before we started yesterday, because with Kauto Star there is always so much attention. I can just imagine the pressure Sam was feeling.

It may not have been his finest hour at Haydock but you have to remember he had only ridden the horse once before. I have a few theories as to why Kauto wasn’t at his brilliant best but he’ll have a fortnight off now before we get some real graft into him before the King George.

Nicholls believes that Walsh, convalescing at home after surgery to remove his spleen, has every chance of being fit for the Boxing Day feature – though probably not before. If he fails, however, a debate on whether Thomas should retain the ride on Kauto Star is possible.

In truth, Kauto Star had been labouring to master supposed inferiors before his stumble opened the way for Snoopy Loopy to snatch the prize from Tamarinbleu with a remarkable late surge. Thomas was mortified. No words can describe how I feel, he said. I was just about to get on top and I think we’d have won. Nicholls supported that view.

The trainer had reassuring news of his more recent Gold Cup winner, Denman, who is back in full exercise after his heart problems. He’s doing two canters a day now and you wouldn’t know he’d had a setback, he said. He’s putting condition back on and he’s right back where I want him.

Nicholls was rightly satisfied with Mr Pointment’s weight-carrying efforts in the Becher and pointed out: Last year he was too free in the National, so we changed the tactics and had Sam hold him up today. If he gets decent ground in April, he should be alright.

Dessie Hughes trained both the winner and the third home, Oulart, and both are likely to return here for the National. Endless Power, who gave the Scottish trainer, Jim Goldie, a second successive Sefton winner, will also come back in April but for the Topham Chase.