The Great Racing Read: Tom Frary

[Wandering Eyes]

Racehorses
By Timeform

My favourite racing book is actually a set of books, Timeform’s Racehorses series, as I am a total nerd when it comes to these beasts. Published as annuals, they satisfy every quest for information on horses that have been and gone and have an abundance of trivia of the day to digest. They give you a real sense of what the racing world was like at that time and they are written as if you are sat with an old sage around a fireplace with the whole evening to spare.

My collection starts in 1970, when Nijinsky II reigned supreme, and runs up to 2004 and, I am embarrassed to admit, the collection still keeps me going back time and again. There are essays on every horse worth knowing about and the best come with profile pictures and pedigrees.

A lot of old arguments are still relevant, too, like this one in the passage on the great Ardross in Racehorses of 1982, which reads, “No commercial breeder nowadays sets out to breed horses for the Cup races, horses likely to be at their peak as four-year-olds or five-year-olds over two and a quarter miles plus, but chance has a large share in the breeding of racehorses and long-distance horses are still being produced and should be catered for fairly. The drift over the past thirty years or so towards breeding for speed at the expense of stamina may have dangerous consequences for the long-term welfare of British racing.”

That sounds like something we’ve heard recently, yes?

If the house was burning, after the wife and kids I’d probably grab these too (although they are heavy, I can attest to that as they’ve followed me everywhere).

If you would like to share your favourite racing book with us, please email emmaberry@thetdn.com.

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