Sir Henry Cecil’s 7 Wins in The Sussex Stakes at Goodwood plus a Tribute to The Great Trainer HRL.

Guy Harwood, What  about the  horse  he  ran  in the King George V1 and Queen Elizabeth Stakes ??

What a character. When Godolphin got their first 2yo winner at Ascot, I said to my pal, lets go and see Sheikh Mo gloating in the winners enclosure.Why my pal said , so as we walked over I told him the story that  Cecil had said , after they took  2yos from him that they will be able to train racehorses but will not be able to make them. Hence it was important for them to get a 2yo winner.Sheikh Mo was beaming. Then we realised that there was someone leaning between us with a big grin on his face.Henry of course. At least he  had a sense of humour.

Cecil, Stoute, Harwood, Cumani, Wragg as someone said, and many, many more

it was the halcoyn days for me...

Barry hills too, made me packets at Donny and Chester.

indeed, barry at chester in certain races was a shoein

and Balding...lol, remember Forest Flower fondly.....so many trainers, and of course no Godolphin or Coolmore which
helped greatly.

Sir Henry was the greatest imo , when i first started betting on flat racing in the mid/late 70s whilst at school there was just something about the guy that made me take notice. The brilliant miler Kris was my absolute favourite in his stable, a lovely looking chestnut who i thought could never get beaten until he got pipped by Tap On Wood in the 2000 Guineas, a race he should have really won. A couple of months later he showed us what he was made of when powering home to win the St James Palace stakes at  Royal Ascot from Guy Harwood's Young Generation, a top horse himself. From memory, even though there was a fair amount of build up to the clash in the press, the race was run at the end of the afternoon and was not shown live on BBC, i remember listening to the Radio 2 commentary on the way home from work.

Following Sir Henry's horses was like supporting a football team for me in those days, especially with so many other top trainers around with their own following.
My brother was a big fan of Dick Hern and made a fair few bob backing Troy and Henbit when they won back to back derbies for his stable. So he had bragging rights for a couple of years at least. What great times they were, shame that things are not so competitive these days.