Latest Blogs from Vincent Finegan and "My Racing Story"

When In Rome

News that Golden Horn is likely to be retired at the end of the season has generated some tried and trusted criticism along the lines of how is flat racing supposed to generate public attention when its headline acts are packed off to stud as soon as their profile threatens to break out of the sport's narrow confines.

9.17AM

New Sherriff In Town

The temptation after every Irish Derby is to read long-term implications into each individual renewal, sometimes positive, but more often in recent years the reaction has been sombre. After Australia's 1-8 rout in 2014 Ireland's premier classic was even written off as a meaningful contest. Maybe the lesson from Jack Hobbs' odds on victory in 2015 is to ease up on portentous readings of the classic tealeaves.

9.32AM

Moore The Greatest?

With success comes popularity and there's no more popular jockey on the planet right now than Ryan Moore. He's winning and everyone loves a winner. The fact he's quite clearly the real deal isn't in doubt. It has become a shorthand description to label Moore as the world's best jockey. Aidan O'Brien labelled him ?the greatest jockey I've ever seen.? So Moore is clearly a talent worthy of comparison to any generation - but the greatest?

9.17AM

'Come On Ireland'

Wrapping the green flag around an Irish-winner tally is more of a Cheltenham indulgence but it would be no surprise to see the history books rewritten come Saturday evening given the strength of this year's Royal Ascot raiding party. There have been a record eight Irish trained Royal Ascot winners in each of the last three years, matching the 2008 tally: what are the odds about that being broken this week, maybe even by hitting the 'Big 10.'

9.23AM

Every Yard Is A Punting Yard

A recent conversation with a racing-worthy generated the name of a wealthy owner who it is generally recognised likes a bet, especially on horses from a certain stable. Except this establishment pillar was having none of it, dismissing the idea by observing the man is worth millions so why should he get worked up about betting. He also dismissively described said stable as a \"punting yard.\"

9.31AM

History Isn't Bunk

Anyone believing history to be bunk need only look at the Derby to be convinced otherwise. The most important race might indeed always be the next one but Epsom's 'blue-riband' is always the most important race of the year precisely because of its history. It's why the Derby finishing post is famously the basis of the thoroughbred breed.

9.33AM

What To Do With A Million

A million quid is small change only to the very wealthiest, and they haven't wound up being the very wealthiest by not knowing the value of a million quid. But as racing here looks forward to a more prosperous financial future, investing a million in state-of-the-art drug-detection equipment might be one timely investment the industry in Ireland could make.

9.12AM

Big-Picture Change

'Taking Ownership' is a typically imprecise piece of corporate-speak, which doesn't mean it's completely meaningless either, unless of course it is applied to those loudly declaring themselves possessed of a stake in that entity known as Irish racing and simultaneously appear unwilling to acknowledge any ownership of it at all when it suits them.

9.18AM

Its Showtime!

BLOG POST 12. This is my final blog post. As I write, I am in the final week of rehearsals for Jockey. My fellow artistic collaborators, Sophie, Sarah- Jane, Jack, Kilian, our producer Kate, stage manager Caoimhe, production manager Adam, racing consultant Dave Donohue and good friends Shane and Muirne have been passionately working hard and putting in long hours to fully realise this whole journey into a theatre and dance performance that is for you, the public - our audience. We work well as a team and the sound of laughter resounds frequently in the rehearsal room. If there isn't laughter, what's the point? I've been dancing, choreographing, acting, structuring, perfecting and rehearsing for 8 hours a day. Yes, there have been sleepless nights but that is just par for the course.

7.34PM

Dancing With Painkillers

BLOG POST 11. April 2015. The first day of rehearsals for Jockey has finally come! I have been gearing up to this day for months, literally. I've had a big obstacle to get through with recovering from a back injury. The past four months for me has been a slow and arduous recuperation. Every day I have been diligently doing my core rehab exercises that Liz Kent set out for me back in January coupled with a gradual progression to a more advanced program from my physiotherapist in Dublin, once I was ready for it. Aside from that I have been doing a lot of general fitness, stretching and strengthening as long as it didn't hurt my back. It has been a case of one step forward, two steps back, but you have just got to keep at it, rest if your body is telling you to and start a fresh when you can.

9.24AM

Apples Oranges & Bananas

One grizzled Irish racing veteran surveyed Willie Mullins's dominance of last week's Punchestown festival and summed it up with a single phrase - \"Ballydoyle-stuff.\" Except an argument can be made that this is singular stuff for which even comparison to flat racing's powerhouse isn't sufficient: Mullins's dominance of Irish jump racing is freakish by any standard.

9.55AM

The Succession Stakes

Even after the longest goodbye in racing history it won't take long for Punchestown's festival to remind everyone of that most perennial of realities - the most important race is always the next one. But in the midst of the eagerly anticipated appearances of Faugheen, Un De Sceaux, Hurricane Fly & Co, plenty will also be keeping a close eye on signs as to who might emerge as favourite for the Tony McCoy succession stakes.

8.53AM

No Point Fighting Gravity

Blog 10. January 2015. It's the first week of the New Year and WillFredd Theatre and I have hit the ground running. What a great way to start the year, I'm back at Halfords, with Toffee, the first pony that I rode over a year (and 13 riding lessons) ago. This time, he's wearing a racing saddle. He looks fantastic if a little incongruous, being a skewbald pony and not a racehorse.

11.45AM

Call Of Duty

What's been most interesting about the High Tail It case at Tipperary hasn't been so much the penalties handed out under 'non-trier' rules as reactions which basically revolve around variants on a 'see worse every day' theme. Inevitably riding shotgun to that view is an implication that those involved might have been hard done by. And the stewarding situation in Ireland means it is possible to see the logic in both points and yet resolutely maintain the officials on duty were dead right.

9.12AM

Throw A Saddle On Fasty

JOCKEY BLOG POST 9. It's December 2014. I've had 11 riding lessons in the past 14 months, which averages out at one every 5 weeks or so. Not many considering this project involves me learning to ride.

6.28PM

A Day At The Races

Blog 8. July 2014. Michael O' Callaghan's Indian Tomahawk is running at Leopardstown. Myself, Sophie and SJ from WillFredd Theatre follow him up the M50 to find a big crowd for a summer evening's racing. There will be a band playing after the racing, and the crowd seem to be a mixture of racing people and newbies like myself. I test my new-found knowledge of reading the form by reading the race card to David Donohue, our resident racing expert. I think I've got it right. I better have, I want to win a few quid! Something to set me up for my retirement from dancing, which I suspect is a similar age as that of a jockey.

10.02AM

The Need Of A Nightmare

The word 'historic' is often mauled into meaninglessness but the next five days truly could be truly significant as Tony McCoy continues his countdown to retirement. He has already stated victory in Saturday's Aintree National will see him pack it in. So the opportunity for Irish race fans to watch one of racing's seminal figures in action at Fairyhouse this Easter should be irresistible. We really won't see his like again.

9.00AM

Getting Closer to this Industry

BLOG POST 7. Meeting David Donohue and Michael O'Callaghan.

9.10AM

Moore Ducks In A Row

With the upcoming Irish and Aintree Grand Nationals yet again taking place in the same week, expect more soul-searching about whether or not the Fairyhouse feature's traditional Easter Monday date is a positive or a negative. In purely racing terms an argument can be made the Easter connection is a minus: the practical reality however is that it is the race's most important plus.

9.13AM

The Two Nijinskys

Blog 6. If I were to ask you to use three words that would describe Nijinsky, what would your response be? You might say, awesome, powerful and well balanced perhaps? But, would you be talking about Vaslav Nijinsky, the Russian ballet dancer and choreographer of Polish descent, or would you be talking about Nijinsky, the Canadian born horse trained by Vincent O' Brien at Ballydoyle who won the Triple Crown in 1970? The language that dance professionals use about the dancer, and the language racing people use about the horse are strikingly similar.

9.10PM

Riding Styles

BLOG 5 - Riding Styles. Leading dancer Emma O' Kane and WillFredd Theatre are preparing to present a dance show Jockey which will premiere at VISUAL, Carlow on May 15th 2015. Emma's been learning how to ride for the project as well as researching her grandfather Phillip De Burgh O' Brien, a bloodstock agent and racing journalist who died before she was born. Over the next few weeks Emma and WillFredd Theatre will bring you an exclusive blog on irishracing.com about Emma's family research, her riding lessons and the creation of Jockey.

4.05PM

10 Hopes And Dreams For Festival 2015

1An oldie but a goldie - cut out the flag-waving. It is juvenile and chippy. Cheltenham is built on the Anglo-Irish rivalry but wrapping the green flag around every Irish winner jars with the nature of that rivalry. And anyone who says it is 'just-a-bit-of-fun' will be entitled to ignore the baggage that automatically goes with flag-waving in these islands when a UK trained winner comes back to the Punchestown winners enclosure festooned in Union Jacks and it gets dismissed as 'just-a-bit-of-fun.'

8.49AM

Fred Archer is a Legend

BLOG POST 4 - Fred Archer is a Legend

6.32PM

Phillip and The Simulator

Leading dancer Emma O'Kane and WillFredd Theatre are preparing for show entitled Jockey, which will come to theatres nationwide in May 2015. Emma's been learning to ride for the project, as well as researching her grandfather Phillip de Burgh O' Brien, a bloodstock agent and racing journalist who died before she was born.

2.25PM

Midweek Can Be The New Weekend

It's been said this week by Willie Mullins but it's been said by so many before that and especially in the past couple of years that Racing is missing a trick not bossing midweek sporting headlines on a regular basis.

4.20PM

Rising Trot

Leading professional dancer Emma O' Kane and WillFredd Theatre are preparing for a show named JOCKEY, which will come to theatres nationwide in May 2015. Emma has been learning to ride for the project, as well as researching her grandfather Phillip de Burgh O' Brien, a bloodstock agent and racing journalist who died before she was born. BLOG POST 2 - Rising Trot

3.16PM

The Long Goodbye

It was said on RacingFM this week that AP McCoy is now going to enjoy the \"long goodbye\" similar to that received by Brian O'Driscoll when he announced he was to retire from Rugby, and I am sure other examples will spring to people's minds when I make that comparison.

7.43PM

In The Blood

Leading professional dancer Emma O' Kane and WillFredd Theatre are preparing to present a show entitled JOCKEY which will premiere at VISUAL, Carlow on May 15th 2015. For this project Emma has been learning how to ride as well as researching her grandfather Phillip De Burgh O' Brien, a bloodstock agent and racing journalist who died before she was born. Over the next twelve weeks Emma will bring you an exclusive blog on irishracing.com about her family research, her riding lessons and the creation of Jockey.

3.56PM

Talent Counts - Not Gender

Racing is so obsessed with success that gender is mostly irrelevant - except it seems in relation to jockeys. The consensus appears to be that female jockeys can still face prejudice. But it's worth betting that when the inevitable occurs and an exceptional female riding talent does emerge from Ireland the fact of her sex will mean nothing. Because even the most Neanderthal of racing males values an edge over the opposition much more than any stupid prejudice.

8.58AM

Bar A Fall

He wins bar a fall, surely that's all that can stop Un De Sceaux in the Arkle now after a show stopping dispatch of two of the most promising novices in training at Leopardstown last weekend.

8.28PM

Joe Prole's Peashooter

The Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney has made his feelings known about a new Horse Racing Ireland board, pledging it will be \"representative as well as functional\" and agreeing with the Oireachtas Committee's view that voices from people at racing's everyday coalface should be heard more. Commendable stuff, heart-warming even: and then he goes just that bit too far - \"This isn't an industry that should be run by the big guns.\" Aw, Simon.

8.50AM

Gowran Fogs up the Gold Cup Picture

I had a great day at Gowran Park yesterday for the Thyestes Chase and have to say everyone did a great job in providing such a great service to the race goers in terms of pictures and commentary once it was clear ( no pun intended) that the fog wasn't going away.

4.36PM

The Glass Must Be Half-Empty

An upcoming announcement on the composition and reach of Irish racing's new drugs taskforce comes on the back of the Cobalt controversy currently dominating headlines in Australia. Three high-profile Australian trainers are under investigation and vehemently protest their innocence. There is also no evidence of cobalt chloride use in Irish racing. But if this taskforce is to be effective it is vital it remembers there was no evidence of steroids here either before the Fenton case. When it comes to doping the presumption always must be the cheats are a step ahead.

9.20AM

To play or not to play

It is a busy time in the Ante Post markets for Cheltenham as the leading contenders strut there stuff on the track and targets are identified in post race interviews. This is always quickly followed by a colourful clamour of bookmaker reps to dazzle you with quotes and stories of piles of cash landing in the offices for one good thing after another.

9.41PM

You Get What You Don't Pay For

The difference between amateur and professional often has nothing to do with ability but rather the professional being able to do the job NOW and the signal of intent that sends out. There is a rather topical link here to the BHA's plans for a belated enquiry into Aidan Coleman's use of the whip in the Welsh National but also in broader terms about the need for professional stewarding in Ireland.

9.06AM

Hearts And Minds Require A Grip

Potentially the single most significant development of 2015 is hair-sample science, something with the capacity to keep a firm grip of those balls which will assure hearts and minds stay focussed on combating doping. Believe the lab wonks and it's only a matter of time before the key to a horse's pharmaceutical history will simply be hanging there in its tail. It must be racing's interests to perfect the science as soon as possible.

8.54AM

How Was It For You

Davy Russell got the Gigginstown bullet on New Year's Eve 2013 so there's a presumption in consigning 2014 completely to history just yet but everyone else seems to be in review-mode and in this case Russell provides a neat synchronicity since his Cheltenham Gold Cup winning ride on Lord Windermere is sure to figure among the most notable highlights when 2014 is recounted.

9.35AM

Planet Fundamental Contradiction

Would the proverbial Martian, if he'd dropped to earth for Ascot's Ladbroke Hurdle, have looked at the outcome and concluded Noel Fehily is a mug? And if so, can a cogent argument be presented as to why he might be wrong? You know, apart from hopelessly subjective stuff about some horses running for the whip and others not: in cold logical terms could you persuade said Martian that the relevant whip rules haven't originated on the planet Fundamental Contradiction?

9.08AM

"Cliff Horses" are not just for Christmas

To be clear from the outset \"Cliff Horses\"; are not for the faint hearted but more for the soft hearted among us who love racing and love being right... Eventually!

4.21PM

The Risk/Reward Dilemma

Clearly Philip Fenton’s decision-making hasn’t been great recently but a call not to appeal the severity of his three year disqualification for possession of anabolic steroids looks a rare piece of sound judgement from the disgraced trainer. History suggests the authorities would have been unlikely to view such chutzpah as an invitation to increase the penalty but few would have quibbled if they had because a sound argument can be made that Fenton has got off lightly.

9.20AM

Equine Personality of the Year

With the return of the enigmatic Mad Moose just a few hours away I noticed the horse had remarkably done more tweeting than running in the last 12 months since his ban by the BHA.The talented, but shall we perhaps say intelligent dual purpose performer, will hit the racetrack again on Saturday and his loyal fan base are right behind him. It might help if that was a literal statement and preferably if they could wave a few items at him to encourage him along once the tapes are released. Just a suggestion…

5.13PM

Australia is Horse of the Year

Horse of the Year is a major sweat in the USA and about as relevant here as racing on dirt. In America the award defines careers: here it defines Horse Racing Ireland’s awards day - which happens to be today – before being more or less forgotten. When Hurricane Fly’s copious achievements are listed, getting Horse of the Year in 2011 and 2013 rarely gets a look in. He’s in there again for 2014 but any other result than Australia might relegate the award to curio status.

9.04AM