The Spirit of Champions Day Past

Persian Punch - the spirit of Champions Day past
see footnote for credits

October is always an emotional month for us. It signals the end of the flat season, and the start proper of the national hunt season. We balance precariously, one hoof in each. As we are a mere 2 legged creature this is not always easy. Many distractions. Too much information. Goodbyes and hellos. Many of our friends only do one or the other code, not both. But we would find it too painful just as winter is coming to have to say goodbye to all of those who kept us company through the summer, without knowing that our winter friends were there to see us through the cold dark wet days.

You find out pretty quick in life that one thing that is certain is change. Autumn signals the time when equine friends go out to grass, to the sales or to the breeding shed. It is hard to say farewell to these horses who have shared the sunshine months with us and once you know that sometimes they never do come back it is impossible. 

October never comes that does not remind us of our biggest friend who gave us the most glorious October ever - Persian Punch. It seems yesterday and yet it was long ago and in a place and a race which no longer exists.

Champions Day on the Newmarket Rowley Mile, October 18th, 2003 when the 10 year old Persian Punch beat the favourite and won his third Jockey Club Cup bringing the house down. 

Punch ran in the Jockey Club Cup on Champions Day upon 5 occasions, winning three times, placed 3rd once, and was unplaced once.  He had been around for a few years and amassed quite a following for a flat horse who ran in group races but never won a Group 1 race. That was the vital thing about him, he was not technically a Champion. But he was most definitely a star. And he lit up flat racing like no other horse for a long while. (Note, it is for another post, but the grey Futher Flight won the Jockey Club Cup FIVE times! He too deserves to be remembered).

Towards the end of his career people went racing just to catch a glimpse of Persian Punch. They crowded round the parade ring to see his big form dragging his tiny Lad Dickie Brown. People cheered him on loudly and lost all thought od decorum if he won. You may see this on a jump track from Market Rasen to Newton Abbot, but emotion is a rare and awe inspiring event on any flat track anywhere. Few horses have been accorded this honour, certainly not those who are not Group 1 winners.

Newmarket Rowley Mile is a beautiful track. Looking down the rolling greeness of it fills you with joy. Especially if the sun is shining and it was the day Punch won his last race and his third Jockey Club Cup there. I've never been so overjoyed on a racetrack. In those days before life had dashed our innocence we thought it could last forever.

Punch looked beaten by Pat Eddery on Millenary but then he rallied and right on the line he thrust his huge head forward. Just enough.  We thought he had lost, then they called a photo finish and Punch and jockey Martin Dwyer knew. While trainers David Elsworth and John Dunlop waited together for the verdict Punch and Martin took a turn and walked back up the course in front of the crowd. When the result of the photo finish was announced the noise was so deafening that you could not hear what was being said. But we all knew. Punch was never beaten in a photo finish. The cheering that day was especially heartening because Millenary had been favourite to win the race. Sometimes, very rarely, it is not just about the betting.

I loved Newmarket. We visited often, the heart would quicken as we drew near and sadden as we drove away down Six Mile Bottom back to the dreaded motorway towards home. On that day, soaked in sunshine and victory we rushed to the long walk in to follow Punch into the Winner's Enclosure and no one stopped us. We knew he was Jeff Smith's horse, but he and David Elsworth gallantly shared him with all of us.  He and Dickie did a victory lap of the parade ring and everyone clapped and cheered until palms hurt and voices became hoarse. We cried tears of joy even though we adored little Millenary too. We could not have known that this would be the last we would ever see of our Punch, that he would die in battle the following Spring or that in October 2005 we would be back at Newmarket to unveil the bronze of him which fans asked the course to have in his memory. At the October 2004 running we were there collecting names and funds for The Persian Punch Memorial so that fans could play a part in obtaining Philip Blacker to create a bronze of him at the course. We knew it was going to be emotional and many of us were in tears several times during the day. The race had been renamed The Persian Punch Jockey Club Cup for the day. Minutes before the race his fans stood on the stairs overlooking the Winning Post and held hands while the course showed a film of that last victory of Punch's. The crowd cheered one last time for our big friend and then in a poetic end to the race Millenary had his own sweet victory in the race which Punch had denied him. On the day that we unveiled the statue to him Cover Up another of those who had raced against Punch and lost out in a photo finish to him won his Jockey Club Cup. We cheered wildly sure that Punchy was cheering his old adversary on too.

Champions Day is gone to Ascot now, The historic Jockey Club Cup was given a new vague name, the 'long distance something or another'. And at the end of this season John Dunlop is retiring too.

This race was safe in the hooves of our equine heroes during our life in racing, they gave their all to honour it. How can such a wonderful race, so richly remembered be given such a stupid meaningless name?

Change is inevitable. And it usually hurts as much as it heals. Progress has a price. 

Champions day at Ascot coincides with the beginning of racing at Cheltenham. Of which we are members. Last year when wonder horse Frankel won The Champion Stakes we were at national hunt headquarters. This year it is Frankel's swansong and we will be at Ascot, which is sold out. It's a good thing, the selling out. It indicates that Frankel is a Hero and people will come just to see him. And that even if they don't come just for the horse they come to acknowledge the greatness of his trainer, Sir Henry Cecil.  Quite right too. It's a return to the days when Persian Punch was our biggest friend and we were content to just see him in the fur, win or lose. Frankel is bound to win, and we hope that he does. It is time that racing people today have their own truly great racehorse to retire unbeaten. The likes of St Simon and Eclipse are getting lonely down that long dark corridor of history.

We have the Arc to get out of the way first though. Sadly the flying filly Dane Dream last year's winner, will not be there. And on the subject of change, Frankie Dettori rides for Coolmore. The most prestigious ride is his, on Camelot, whilst young Joseph rides St Nicholas Abbey because he cannot do the weight for Camelot. Never thought we would see Frankie back on a Coolmore bound equine, after he won The St Leger on Scorpion and his employers Godolphin did not enjoy being beaten by their own jockey on somone else's horse.

Never say never.

Footnote:

Collage One
Paintings of Punch 1. No Surrender by David Dent  2. True Grit by Caroline Cook
Photos: Winning photo by Steve Cargill for Newmarket Racecourse
Back of Martin Dwyer in victory salute by Getty
All others by Famous Racehorses

Collage Two
Memorial Raceday racecard picture from a painting by Jacqueline Stanhope
Photos of bronze from Philip Blacker