Newsletter-April Edition
March 27th, 2006 – the first day of what I would call decent weather since before Christmas. Even my skiing colleagues admit that the snow and ice went on for too long. And now there are only 6 days until the scheduled beginning of the racing season at Velka Chuchle on Sunday April 2nd. March 28th, 2006 – a rainy day – we will be lucky if the course is fit for racing on Sunday!
A few days ago I went to the Open Day at the Blue Blue Sky stables at Dymokury. About 60 people were there. They saw 12 Polish-bred two-year-olds, all of them available for sale. Also on show were the stable's resident stallion, Wallace, and several foals, yearlings and two-year-olds by Exaltation, Wallace and Gay Devil, as well as some racehorses and brood mares that were available for sale. Among the visitors were trainers Roman Vitek, V. Fedorowicz and Juergen Albrecht, as well as Swiss Fans owners Marco Lehmann and Elsbeth Ullius. Trainer Pavel Kinsky and his staff, including assistant trainer Libor Sindar, stable jockey Jaroslav Donoval and Helena Donovalova, were good and attentive hosts. Two horses were sold and one was leased, and seven remained in Dymokury and are available for reasonable offers. Blue Blue Sky stable owner Chris Richner was pleased to have a good number of visitors on a rainy afternoon, and some sales and expressions of interest, but was disappointed that few stayed on for the Led Zeppelin Revival concert at the Rock Factory in Dymokury, another Chris Richner enterprise. Chris and I reckon that both Robert Plant and Jimmie Page would have difficulty getting into the Led Zeppelin Revival line-up. They would surely have appreciated the compliment paid to them before a small audience on a Saturday evening in east Bohemia.
Blue Blue Sky trainer Pavel Kinsky has eight expected runners next Sunday, but he has had great difficulty preparing them, with snow on the ground from mid December until near the end of March. When I asked how ready the horses were, he pulled a face – but would not any trainer! I mean to say, what a stupid question!!
All the Dymokury three-year-olds are aimed at the big races, but, with a maximum field of 14 in races at Velka Chuchle, all will need a good performance in April or May to get a high enough rating to qualify, let us say, for the Derby. Of the colts, Ferrier and Nonao run on the opening day, and Jermak, owned by British syndicate Pony Club 6, will run in mid April. Ferrier might be a good miler, while Nonao will probably need more distance. Jermak is still unraced. The five 3-y-o fillies, Leme’s Hoffnung, Neera, Sexy Rheinberg, Sweet Dreams and Thunder Flower, should also all run in April to qualify for the 1000 Guineas.
Last year’s Blue Blue Sky star was Arrinao, 4th in the 2000 Guineas, 2nd in the Derby and 4th in the St Leger. He is back to fitness, and will be entered for the main race at Velka Chuchle on April 9th. After that, he may run in Germany. The stable’s two good nine-year-old sprinters (!), Silnar and Djibouti, will both run in the Gomba Handicap on April 2nd. Four-year-old Patton showed plenty of ability, little application and no discipline last year. He will be aimed at long-distance races, and may be tried over hurdles. Profit was a reasonable novice hurdler last year, and Major Wako won a good novice steeplechase.
The new stable jockey, Jaroslav Donoval, was champion jockey in 2002, but his fortunes slumped after that, so much so that he got himself a job outside racing for a while last summer, before making a comeback. His wife, Helena Donovalova, has ridden 14 winners, and is also making a comeback, after having a baby. She will pick up some rides on the stable’s second choice. The Blue Blue Sky stable is pleased to have several good work riders this year: assistant trainer Libor Sindar is a recently-retired jockey, and Libor Simunek will ride the jumpers in training and in their races, and the Donovals are riding work, too.
Steeplechasing gets off to a slower start than flat racing here. Pardubice has not put on races in April in the past, preferring to let the natural crosscountry fences grow a bit in the springtime. This year, we have a meeting on Saturday, April 22nd, but without crosscountry races. Instead, there will be some races over hurdles and some oval track steeplechases over artificial fences, and also some flat races. It is a low-key meeting and is unlikely to attract top horses. At Radslavice on April 29th there is a Category II crosscountry chase, and at Lysa on May 1st there will probably be a good field for the Category I First of May Steeplechase.
There will be better opportunities for our top chasers in April over the borders, at Bratislava, at Merano and in Germany and France. Leading trainer Cestmir Olehla trains on high ground at Svetla Hora, where there has been a lot of snow this winter. His Masini, winner of the 2004 Gran Premio at Merano, is entered at Bratislava on April 9th, but most of the Olehla horses will not be seen much before I write again, a month from now. One or two horses trained by Josef Van’a and ridden by champion jockey Josef Bartos have already started their season in France and Germany.
The oddest story in Czech racing in March concerns the latest installment in the Monlit affair. Monolit (by Rainbows for Life, out of Moonbride – Groom Dancer) was first past the post on May 2nd, 2004 in a Group 2 race at Ebreichsdorf, a new racecourse south of Vienna. This was the most valuable race ever won by a Czech-bred horse. A few days later Monolit was disqualified, because he had been ridden by Czech jockey-trainer Martin Knauer. According to Austrian rules, a trainer may only ride horses trained by himself. Subsequently, Monolit was reinstated after an appeal, because Austrian rules (apparently) allow an appeal only within a limited time after the race, and the appeal against Monolit had been (allegedly) too late. However, an appeal was made against the appeal, and Monolit was again disqualified (I do not know why). Recently, Monolit’s owner, Josef Rosina, announced that he was taking Ebreichsdorf to court. Then, a week or so ago, entries closed for the Central European Breeders’ Cup races, which will be run at Ebreichsdorf in October 2006. When the entries were published, the three horses entered by Josef Rosina were at first listed and then removed from the list. The owner then received an e-mail informing him that the entries had not been accepted. When a Czech journalist asked why the entries had been rejected, he was told that the rules at Ebreichsdorf, and at most other courses, state that entries can be rejected without giving a reason.
In the last few weeks, Czech racing has lost two major figures, both at the age of 76. Jaroslav Masek won the Czechoslovak Derby as a jockey on Symbol and six times as a trainer (Seal, Elita, Veronal, Sudan, Nelson and Cedros). He was a regular at Velka Chuchle races right up to the end of last season, a modest and dignified man, and one of the legends of Czechoslovak racing.
Just last week, Jaroslava Moserova passed away. Her translations of Dick Francis's books are one of the reasons why the books are so popular in the Czech Republic. She and Dick Francis met several times and were good friends - it was memorable to see these two grand old people sitting together at the Velka Pardubicka meeting in 2004. Jaroslava Moserova was senator for Pardubice, a former Czech ambassador to Australia and New Zealand, president of the Czech Commission for UNESCO and a member of the UNESCO Executive Board in Paris. She was also a qualified medical doctor! Just a few years ago, she was a narrowly-defeated candidate for the presidency of the Republic. She took every opportunity to go racing at Pardubice and at Velka Chuchle.