October 2016 was autumnal. There was a fair amount of rain, the days got shorter and the afternoons got chillier. This year, like most years, we have had very little soft going, and when it finally arrived, in mid October, the season was almost over.

I am writing this in early November, just after our racing season came to an end. The Czech horseracing season ends too early, not only for the professionals but also the fans. A five-month break is unnecessarily long. We would like racing to continue here into November, and to recommence in March. However, a major extension of the season would require an all-weather track, and also a source of funding for winter prizes.

Our betting market, a major contributor funding for racing in most administrations, has continued to be very poor this year, in every way. The de facto monopoly bookmaker, Betino, offers miserly odds, attracts an extremely low betting turnover, has high overheads, and contributes little to Czech horseracing. Betino no longer has the status of a de jure monopoly. For years there has been discussion about PMU offering our races, and high level negotiations have resumed this summer. Very few of us would be sad if Betino were to be displaced, and many would like PMU to get involved without further delay.

Racing professionals cannot afford to take five months off between the beginning of November and the beginning of April, either in terms of earning money or in terms of gaining experience. Our best riders, with their EU passports, can go abroad and do some work riding in one of the main horseracing centres, where there are nowadays plenty of Czechs able to help them get a winter job and quickly feel at home. Hibernating in the Czech Republic, putting on 4 kg of weight and struggling from mid-February to take the weight off again, should be a thing of the past for our qualified riders.

For our trainers it is more difficult to get away, as they have a home base and a stable of horses to maintain. Josef Váňa snr always keeps a few of his horses in training through the winter. Václav Luka jnr, in particular, has good all-weather training facilities, and takes selected horses to run on the flat in France for most of the winter months. However, most of the smaller trainers are unable to race their horses anywhere for five twelfths of the year!

A feature of this season has been the number of Czech-trained horses that have run successfully abroad. Czech-trained horses have actually won more prize money abroad than at home this year. The season may have ended in the Czech Republic, on the first Saturday in November, but plenty of our trainers will continue to send selected horses to run abroad as long as they have more or less reasonable conditions for training and reasonably safe conditions on the roads for transporting the horses to distant racecourses.

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There are only about ten serious writers about Czech racing who write on a frequent basis, though of course plenty more people write something interesting from time to time, on topics that they consider to be of particular current concern, or on specialized topics such as equine health. However, none of the serious writers contribute regularly to the mainstream printed press: the good stuff is nowadays exclusively on web sites (from which it can find its way on to Facebook).

The mainstream press equates racing with the Velka Pardubicka, and the Velka Pardubicka with Josef Váňa. Last year, of course, there was also the Velka Pardubicka drugs scandal, and this year there was Martina Růžičková, Barbora Málková, and Charme Look’s win, but as far as the mainstream press is concerned it is basically Josef Váňa or nothing. Mainly nothing.

Josef Váňa is of course, a great personality with an extraordinary life story, and the holder of almost all records linked to the Velka. He has also been our champion jumps trainer every year for longer than I can remember. He is the trainer of several Czech Derby winners and Gran Premio di Merano winners, and he is currently the vice-president of the Jockey Club of the Czech Republic, etc., etc.

Martin Cáp, one of my Ten Serious Writers about Czech racing, wrote on www.aktualne.cz after the Velka Pardubicka that it is time for us to write about the next generation of heroes of Czech racing. He pointed out that, in particular, Jan Faltejsek’s achievement in winning the Velka for the fourth time has gone almost uncelebrated in the mainstream press. Martin pointed out that when Václav Chaloupka and Josef Váňa won the race for the fourth time they were national heroes. Why is Jan Faltejsek treated by the mainstream press as being “only half way to Váňa’s achievement”? 

A young lady who happens to have won multiple Olympic medals in the obscure sport of speed skating is deservedly a national heroine, as are the multiple women’s javelin champion and the ladies’ 400 metres hurdles champion. Although the national teams in football and in ice-hockey are nothing special at the moment, the names of the players are on the lips of every sports follower. So why are our half dozen international-class jockeys not also raised to the level of national and international heroes?

In the last two weeks of the season, when the biggest races were over, quite a lot of attention was in fact turned on our jockeys. Not by the mainstream press, of course, but at least among the racing community. Both the flat racing jockeys’ championship and the jumps jockeys’ championship were wide open until late on the last day of the season, at Kolesa. Both championships were in fact decided by photo finishes on the final day of the season at Kolesa. Jan Kratochvíl did not get his head in front all season, until that last afternoon, but in the end he retained his championship from the previous season. Congratulations to him on his win on Mazhilis in the Gran Premio di Merano at the end of September, his 2nd place on Ange Guardian in the Velka Pardubicka, a number of other wins and now the championship winner’s prize. What a fine end to his season! Marek Stromský will have enjozed beating Jaroslav Myška by a nose in a subsequent race and thus denyin him the championship. Jan Rája led the flat jockeys’ championship all season, and a couple of months ago it seemed unlikely that anyone else would get near to him. Then his winners dried up, and Bauyrzhan Murzabayev rapidly closed the gap. At Most, during the penultimate afternoon of the season, Murzabayev even took the lead in the championship, but Jan Rája promptly overtook him again. Neither of them had a winner on the last day, though Murzabayev was beaten by just a neck in one of the race. Jan Rája is the champion, by the narrowest of margins, after a long break. He had previously been champion in 2004 and in 2005. He is heavier than Murzabayev, and had fewer rides, and he deserves his unexpected success this year. Murzabayev has ridden 22 winners abroad this year. He has not concentrated on winning the Czech championship, and he too can be pleased with another successful season.

Our five-month winter break is a challenge for the writer of monthly newsletters. Last winter, the saga of the drug samples and the battle between the Jockey Club and the racecourses gave me plenty to write about. I hope there will be happier things to write about this winter in the off-season.