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.

You would think racing's powers would appreciate the importance of history in selling the sport more, especially so in Britain. It is that which continues to fascinate an ownership elite into spending billions: it certainly isn't prizemoney. Those pushing the prizemoney agenda may argue the elite's presence generates a false picture but the reality is they are there and they're there because of the prestige that comes with history.

Does anyone think the Qatari Princes would rather win a Breeders Cup Classic rather than the Derby because they'd get more prizemoney out of it?

Yet those charged with promoting racing, not just in Britain but in Ireland too, often park that history to the side when it comes to selling the game. Apart from the fact people tend to prefer deciding for themselves what they like - especially with such a black and white sport as racing - the push is always change, something new, something different, often for its own sake, when in fact it is the tried and trusted which can be the most potent attraction.

Pointing that out invites dinosaur comparisons and accusations of being out of touch with this new fast-moving digital environment. But since the basis of the whole thing - the horses - haven't got significantly faster in the last 240 odd years, and they continue to hold a fundamental attraction no matter how much Robocop tech we hang on ourselves, it might reasonably be pointed out that speed is always relative.

It will be very relative indeed this Saturday. This looks an open Derby. That's often another way of saying a poor Derby, and it isn't just Jim Bolger who suspects the 2015 crop of colts to be comparatively underwhelming. It certainly doesn't look to be a Derby to confirm an outstanding champion a la Sea The Stars or Shergar.

Then again, it's almost a reflex to run down the Derby field. Increasingly the whole point of the race is to identify talent rather than confirm it, a first stage in a process if you like, yet it is the shadow of every Derby since 1779 that heaps significance on to the race, no matter what fluctuating fashions in terms of breeding or scheduling might temporarily suggest.

So with so much unknown, every potential clue is clung to, especially when it comes to the breeding influence of who's likely to last out a mile and a half best. The result is sometimes speculative spoofery wrapped up in supposed expertise since definitively knowing you stay a mile and a half before Epsom is almost invariably an insurmountable negative. Just to muddy the waters further, explosive speed can be too.

The Coolmore team have presumably long since twigged that, which is why Gleneagles is on-route to the St James's Palace Stakes over a mile, just as Aidan O'Brien and Ryan Moore have always insisted he should. History tells us those horses capable of winning both the Guineas and the Derby are among the best of the best. Good as he is Gleneagles doesn't strike as a colt in the class of Sea The Stars or Nijinsky?

Giovanni Canaletto presents a real quandary. For much of the Gallinule Stakes he didn't appeal at all, what with a high head carriage looking to explain a rare noseband on a Ballydoyle runner. But he did run on noticeably well in the closing stages. O'Brien's horses can produce dramatic improvement in a short timeframe and Giovanni Canaletto's brother, Ruler Of The World, was a noticeable example. Nevertheless he looks something of a hit and hope job.

Golden Horn is a form standout and those doubting his stamina could be deluding themselves. Impressive as he was in the Dante though, there's something still not quite convincing about Golden Horn, a statement that could easily look foolish come Saturday evening when formbook devotees may well be able to argue it was all staring us in the face.

But there remains something exciting about an unbeaten record going into the Derby and the only other unbeaten colt is Zawraq. By definition there's a lot of guesswork with a horse who's only run twice, and his stamina is total guesswork. Ordinarily though anything out of a Sadlers Wells mare has a chance of staying. And if Zawraq does properly stay he can finally provide Dermot Weld with that elusive 'blue riband' victory.

It is 25 years since Weld secured an historic Belmont Stakes triumph with Go And Go who beat a Kentucky Derby winner, Unbridled, a horse that went on to land the Breeders Cup Classic yet could finish only fourth in New York when he wasn't allowed run on lasix.

This Saturday night American Pharoah will attempt to secure a first Triple Crown for 37 years in the Belmont. He will be the 13th Triple Crown aspirant to arrive in New York with the crown in his sights since Affirmed. Three of the previous thirteen - War Emblem, Real Quiet and Silver Charm - were also trained by Bob Baffert.

And once again lasix is in the picture, except this time the Belmont runners can run on it. Racing across the pond has "progressed" that far in quarter of a century, clearly learning what it wants to learn from history.

Continuing on the international theme, it will be fascinating to see how Hurricane Fly fares in next Sunday's French Champion Hurdle. Hindsight actually makes his Punchestown defeat by Jezki a month ago look better. It really did look like his jumping let him down. How he copes with a return to Auteuil's obstacles will be intriguing.

In the midst of classic season, 'The Fly' could run into Vincent Cheminaud at Auteuil too. France's champion jump jockey looked the real deal winning the Jockey Club on New Bay, although some of the coverage expressed surprise a jump jockey could be so polished.

It's hardly unknown however for riders to successfully switch codes. A certain L Piggott wasn't too shabby. Neither was JP Murtagh. And that's not delving too far back into history either.