This September newsletter has caused me some trouble. I normally begin the newsletters with comments on the weather in the last four weeks, and with events that took place within that same period of time. After that, there is usually something about coming events.

I therefore set out to write about August 2018. The trouble was that there was nothing bright and uplifting to report on. Only how hot and dry it had been, and how little interesting racing there had been here. There was not even much positive news about the numerous Czech-trained runners abroad. Each effort to write produced something depressing and depressed, and I finally decided that your life is too short and too valuable to waste on reading what I really thought about Czech racing in August 2018.  

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There were two options for those handling our top horses in July and August: either give them a rest, or run them abroad. For lower-class horses, there were some meetings at up-country racecourses. However, our upcountry courses are declining fairly rapidly. This year, there were no meetings between July 8th and the end of August at any of the Class C courses, with the exception of Mimoň and Slušovice. The meetings at Světlá Hora and Netolice were just before and just after the dates mentioned in the previous sentence. Karlovy Vary and Most, near the German border and cooler and rainier than the rest of the country in the summer months, provided most of our summer racing. Prague Velká Chuchle took a ten-week break after the Czech Derby.

Pardubice had racing on August 18th, and the ground staff had worked hard and used a lot of water to produce ground that was more or less OK for steeplechasing. Quite a few Pardubice residents complained about water being made available for the racecourse in preference to their own gardens. In spite of the ground staff’s efforts, the racecourse was unpleasantly hot and dry and dusty. The otherwise very unsatisfactory VP August qualification race was unexpectedly brightened by a great battle down the finishing straight between Váňa-trained No Time To Win and Váňa-trained Theophilos. Mudspattered No Time To Win had won the 2017 Velka heroically, and now he prevailed in the August qualification race, where the ploughed fields threw a mini-duststorm up into the air as soon as the leading horse’s feet hit the thin layer of ploughed topsoil.   

The number of enthusiasts who want to organize race meetings in the hot, dry summer months has fallen quite sharply, especially with reference to the short narrow up-country tracks that have no irrigation system. In addition, declining numbers of owners are happy to send their horses out to run on these courses, and at the same time the number of horses in training has been dropping quite steadily. Even if cooler, less dry summers come back, I am not sure that there will be revived interest here in low-quality racing on courses with more or less primitive facilities.

Indeed, the trend seems to be that smaller numbers of owners purchase smaller numbers of more expensive horses. Quality, rather than quantity. Just a few owners, notably Rabbit Trhový Štěpánov, still seem to have a strategy of buying a lot of medium-price horses in the hope that one of them will be outstanding. Rabbit also likes breeding with its own mares. A couple of other trainers, Petr Kantek and Michal Kalčík, are also not following the trend. They have yards full of older horses that were bought well into their career as tough ready horses that can go out and compete successfully in low-category races. Generally speaking, however, the trend is to buy better horses, abroad, and if the horse turns out to be as good as was hoped, to take it abroad at least for some of its races.

That is enough about August 2018. As soon as September began (and this newsletter was still unwritten, or should I say unstarted), the weather changed. On September 1st, in Prague, it rained all day. It now seems that thirty-plus degree temperatures, which had been the norm for many weeks, may be over for this year. On September 2nd, Prague Velká Chuchle at long last resumed its role as the centre of Czech flat racing, with two major races on the card. The 40th running of the Martin Tour Travel Agency Prague Grand Prix, 1 600 metres, attracted a very good field, and Saša, a 4-y-o British-bred mare by Makfi, was a surprise winner. She was ridden by Vendula Korečkova, who is having her best ever season. She is in fourth place in the flat jockeys’ championship, with 16 winners already.  Blessed Kiss won the Czech St Leger in style. She had won the Czech Derby well, and finished a close second in the Slovak Derby at Bratislava in July. French-bred Blessed Kiss, by Kentucky Dynamite (USA) out of Blanc Sur Blance (IRE) (Hold That Tiger (USA)), is owned by Yerbol Baizhasrkinov and is trained at Velká Chuchle by Igor Endaltsev.

Blessed Kiss was ridden by Václav Janáček, who in August became the second Czech jockey, after Filip Minařík, ever to ride 1 000 winners. There was some discussion about when he rode that 1 000th winner, as some of us gave it to him on a Friday, while others claimed that we should not have counted his winner on the snow at Arosa, in Switzerland. However, he rode his undisputed 1 000th winner just a couple of days later, and I am happy to congratulate him for a second time. Like every other jockey that has ridden 1 000 winners, he has worked very hard and can ride a bit. Although he has been based in Spain for the last 5 or 6 years, he gets back to central Europe quite frequently.

Since the 1st European Jockeys Cup meeting, in 2015, it has been a problem what to do with the traditional major autumn meeting, which has traditionally featured the Prague Grand Prix, 1 600 metres, and the Czech Horseracing Grand Prix, 2 400 metres. In these races, our top 3-y-os take on the older horses for the first time. The solution of running the Grand Prix over a mile on St Leger Day, and the Grand Prix over one-and-a-half miles on EJC day – Saturday, September 22nd – makes a lot of sense. The EJC Leram Million, over 1 400 metres, will no doubt attract several of the horses that ran well in the Prague Grand Prix.

There will be plenty of good racing at Velká Chuchle in September. On Sunday, September 9th, the main event will be the E.Ž. Praha, a.s. Gold Cup, hurdles, 4 200 metres, with prize money of CzK 360 000. I hope some supplementary entries will be announced with the declarations to run, as this race desrves a good field. There will be meetings at Velká Chuchle every Sunday until the end of October, with the exception of EJC day, which is on a Saturday (September 22nd), and October 14th, which is Velka Pardubicka day.

The autumn meetings at Pardubice are on Saturday, September 8th, featuring the September VP qualifiation race. Promising 7-y-os Buonarroti and Tzigane du Berlais both have not yet qualified for the big race, and Delight My Fire, third in VP 2017, is entered for this qualification race instead of the Wielka Wroclawska, though she has already qualified for October 14th. The Velka Pardubicka meeting is over two days, with three potentially interesting races, over hurdles and over the classical steeplechase course, and five minor races, on Saturday, October 13th, and eight races, all over the crosscountry course, on Sunday, October 14th. The final meeting of the season at Pardubice is on Saturday, October 27th. The list of meetings before the end of our season is on  http://www.dostihyjc.cz/dostihy.php

I hope you are planning a visit to the Czech Republic this autumn. These are good times in this country, I should say, and visitors should come and enjoy them with us residents.