DEBUTANTE

Courtesy John Guy

Miracle Rouge made her debut today, and, following an awful start, came fourth by a neck, completing the final furlong in devastating style - she was still last with just 200m to go! Seems like she has potential, that's for sure, and it will be fascinating to see what she can do in the future with that level of finishing speed.

The photo of Miracle Rouge comes courtesy of a fellow Brit, John Guy, who I was hoping to meet at Tokyo-Fuchu. We'll definitely get together soon, John, but in the meantime, many thanks indeed for sending the picture across - much appreciated! Also, for those interested, the JRA website has this video footage of the race: 201205050306h.asx

Tomorrow it's the turn of Mistoffelees to get fired up, after many delays on the road to the starting gate. I have my fingers crossed that the Nijinsky and Secretariat blood running through his veins will shine through, but if his performance is as strong as that of Miracle Rouge today, I'll be happy, regardless of his finishing position.

A lot of the afternoon and early evening was spent with Hironori Sato and his family. His boy, Shoma, is already en route to becoming a jockey, following in his father's footsteps, and hopefully, he'll do well at Mie tomorrow. Playing together today, one wonders if Shoma and Sophie will be rivals on the track in the future? Now there's an interesting thought...

Meanwhile, although Miracle Rouge was out of medal contention today, news filtered through the grapevine just after lunch that Tokoro's Yoshimi Bamba won her Class in the All-Japan Championship with Twister, which is a remarkable achievement. Well done, Yoshimi!

CHURCHILL
Born in 1874, Sir Winston Churchill was one of Britain's most famous and most-loved Prime Ministers, guiding the country through WWII in his own inimitable way. Not everything he did was right, and he was known the hit the bottle rather hard on occasion, but in these pages, none of that really matters. What does matter is that he loved horses. Indeed, he once said: “There is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man.”

Courtesy LIFE

Churchill started his military career in the cavalry, and was later responsible for saving thousands of war horses stranded in mainland Europe after the end of the Great War. That's actually a rather timely statement given the recent release of a movie on war horses, although my own image of Churchill's equine links comes from the racing side.

Seeing as Churchill was born and raised at Blenheim Palace, and the various Dukes of Marlborough (his ancestral family line) had always shown an interest in breeding Thoroughbreds, I'd assumed that Blenheim (an Epsom Derby winner, present in Jaguar's bloodlines) was one of his horses, but in fact it was Lord Carnarvon's stallion. As it happens, despite his deep love of the turf, it wasn't until he was 75 that he started to pour his attention towards creating a racing stable.

One of his first purchases was a French-bred horse named Colonist, which he bought as a three-year old in 1949. It came second in the Ascot Gold Cup, and later stood at HM the Queen's stud at Sandringham. In all, Churchill had around 40 horses at the peak of his days as an owner, bringing him a total of 75 wins, including one classic, when Dark Issue won the 1955 edition of the Irish 1000 Guineas.

Even though some MPs criticized his links with the turf, Sir Winston simply brushed aside the pressure from those in Parliament until ill health finally put an end to his racing enterprises. One of the most influential figures in Britain's history, he died in 1965.

CELEBRATION
Usually, as you'll have probably noticed by now, a new horse gets tacked onto the list at the bottom of the page whenever I need cheering up. Today, it's to celebrate finishing another book - all the proofing has been completed and an index compiled, so the project has been put to bed as far as I'm concerned.

Courtesy Carrot Club

We'll go into the bloodlines in detail another day, suffice to say that the sire is Taiki Shuttle (the perfect example of what you get by mixing Hail To Reason and Nijinsky blood), while the damsire is Special Week, which gives us another pair of Hail To Reason and Nijinsky lines. Indeed, the colt is officially a Halo cross (3Sx4D), while Danehill and Blushing Groom feature on the female side of the family tree. For me, this is like a member of royalty!

Bloodlines apart, this is also one of the most beautiful horses I've ever seen - he'll certainly turn heads in the paddock next year, that much is for sure...

THURSDAY TRANQUILITY
Working away like a mad thing at the moment, so very little done to the blog today - sorry about that! I did escape the office for a brief respite this afternoon, as my eyes were starting to get tired, but Jaguar wasn't in the mood to play. As such, it was a relatively quiet visit to Tokoro, although Louis did some training with Heart, as he wants to start entering show-jumping competitions from the beginning of next year. Jaguar certainly isn't cut out for jumping - he launches over a fence like a jet fighter and lands the other side like a lead weight!

Courtesy Carrot Club

Just received a photo of Miracle Rouge, along with a letter of congratulations on her making her race debut at the weekend. She looks beautiful, and it will be fascinating to see how this Sadler's Wells cross does - she certainly has the right bloodlines, and looks tighter than a greyhound.

Actually, on the subject of greyhounds, I'd love to introduce greyhound racing to Japan. They have it in Hong Kong, as a throwback from the days of British rule, and I reckon it could be a huge hit here - it's compact, relatively cheap to set up and run (keeping dogs is a lot less expensive than keeping horses!), and incredibly exciting. If anyone reading this knows how I could get things rolling on this front, please get in touch...

THE LATEST RACING NEWS
Tenshinramman was given a clean bill of health after her race, and has now been sent to Fukushima to rest for a while. 'Kacchi' Tanaka, the jockey, is full of apologies for the result on Saturday, but it really wasn't his fault. As I said before, putting so many young horses together was always going to be a lottery. Selecting her next race to suit her undoubted ability will be the most important step in securing her future. As far as I'm concerned, Tanaka-san has shown a lot of faith in 'Tenny', and they work well together. If events are chosen where she can display her awesome speed, I'd love to see them race as a team in the classics next year.

Miracle Rouge has been confirmed for the Tokyo 6R on the 10th (with Yoshitomi Shibata as jockey), and Mistoffelees will race on the 11th with Genki Maruyama aboard. In addition, a new announcement comes today, with Harmony Fair and Masayoshi Ebina booked for the Tokyo 5R (1400m) on the 18th.

Next week, Fairy Robe will be sent to the Komukai Training Centre, meaning she's nearly ready to race. I have my fingers crossed that she'll be assigned to Hironori Sato, as she will be based at the Yamazaki Stable. I hope to visit Kawasaki on a regular basis once Fairy Robe has settled in...

MASASHIGE HONDA
Continuing our series on jockeys, today we take a look at Masashige Honda. Born in Tokyo in March 1988, he got his licence in September 2005, and competed in his first race during the following month. Based at the Shibuya Stable at the Funabashi track, 'Mar-kun' rode his first winner in February 2006, and has clocked up well over 100 since.

In February 2009, he entered the record books after riding an outsider to victory to give a winning punter who picked the top three horses in order a huge 19,110,000 yen pay-out. At first, he assumed it was 1,900,000 yen! But the win brought a great deal of publicity for the young rider, bringing him a JRA ride later in the year.

He's proved that with the right horse he can do the business. So far this year, with the favourite underneath him, he's ridden to victory four times out of every fifth entry. This colourful character has even managed to garner the support of Sophie - unless, of course, he's riding against some other guy in black and yellow!

THE 100th POST
The 100th post is something of a landmark for the blog, I guess, and a sudden rush of interest from Latvia yesterday (no less than 30 hits, believe it or not!) has pushed us beyond the 4500 visitors mark. I have no idea what prompted this, or why things went wild in this particular country, well outside the regular viewing audience, but the power of the internet never ceases to amaze me...

Many thanks to everyone who has checked out my nutty ramblings on these pages thus far. And please stay tuned, as the racing programme is really taking off - there's no end to the news items, it seems. In the next few days, in-between proofing and indexing the latest Mercedes book, I'll write a few pieces on some more jockeys, a stable or two, and historical snippets that have caught my attention recently. I'll also keep you updated on the ex-racers in my life, and the progress Louis and Sophie are making with them in the Joba arena.

THE RACEHORSES #13: No.190 
It's been a couple of weeks since I bought anything, and I was starting to get the shakes! Yes, you've guessed it, another horse - an NAR runner - has been added to the bottom of the page, this time a Sunday Thoroughbred Club filly by Admire Japan out of After Beat. 

Admire Japan has some very interesting bloodlines, with the Hail To Reason DNA I love so much passed down to Sunday Silence, while his dam is Biwa Heidi - a wonder mum if ever there was one! Her strength comes from Caerleon, one of Nijinsky's finest.

Courtesy Sunday TC

After Beat was sired by Creator, a strong horse that ran extensively in France, boasting Mill Reef as his father. The female line is dominated by Amber Shadai via Northern Taste, and going back further, there are Northern Dancer and Sir Gaylord crosses in the equation once we take both the dam and sire families into account as a whole. As well as winning a number of Stakes races, Sir Gaylord fathered Sir Ivor, and that makes him very special in my eyes. 

Well, that brings the NAR kids back up-to-date, at least for the time being! We'll take a look at the JRA yearlings I have a stake in in due course... 

MORE 'JOCKEY VIEW' VIDEOS
Two more YouTube videos have just been released via the Funabashi Keiba website. The one showing Clave Secreta at speed is available through the following link 騎手目線の調教動画第３弾!!!クラーベセクレタ  while the Magnifica version can be accessed by this link 騎手目線の調教動画第２弾!!マグニフィカ. Great fun!

THE JAPANESE CLASSICS
Not really in the mood for work, so as promised, a short piece on the Japanese classic races and their English equivalent. The three races that make up the Triple Crown are the Tokyo Yushun (the Japanese Derby), the Kikuka Sho (the Japanese St Leger), and the Satsuki Sho (the Japanese 2000 Guineas).

The Tokyo Yushun, which was inaugurated in 1932, is held at the Tokyo-Fuchu track, while the other two were first ran just before the Second World War - the Kikuka Sho at Kyoto, and the Satsuki Sho at Nakayama in Chiba. It is perhaps the Kanto races that spawn the most famous racers, although Dance In The Dark, Mayano Top Gun and Mejiro McQueen stand out as recent winners of the long-distance event that didn't succeed in the two shorter ones.

The other true classics are the Yushun Himba (the Japanese Oaks) and the Oka Sho (the Japanese 1000 Guineas). For fillies only, both were inaugurated at the end of the 1930s, with the former held at Tokyo-Fuchu and the latter at the Hanshin track.

Other Japanese races of note, although not classics in the true sense of the definition in horse racing terms, are the Arima Kinen, which began in 1956 at Nakayama, and the Takarazuka Kinen, held at the Hanshin track since 1960. Both of these are all-star races, with the entry largely chosen by the public, meaning only the strongest, most popular horses of the year get to make it to the starting gate. As such, both are as close to a classic race as you'll get without actually being one.