First the company report. Readers who invested a tenner on the nose each time our Twelve to Follow for the Flat turned out have made a wallet-warming profit of £638. Only the management consultants on whom a panicky government has showered gold-plated contracts with no questions asked have done better than that in these Covid times.
The dozen contested 39 races and seven won, four of them more than once. The standout was James Fanshawe’s filly Audarya. After a 12-1 Newcastle success she was sent to France for the Group One Prix Jean Romanet. Ridden by Ionitz Mendizabal, she won by a neck with British bookmakers paying 33-1. On-course investors with the Pari-Mutuel collected at 47-1. Audarya concluded her season last weekend by triumphing in the hands of Pierre-Charles Boudot in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare in the US. Locals got 17-1; British bookmakers paid out at only 12-1.
Another two-time winner, before injury forced his retirement, was Marcus Tregoning’s brilliant miler Mohaather, whose Sussex Stakes victory at Goodwood was the best race of the season. Michael Dods won twice with Brunch, at 7-1 and 15-2, and John Gosden won a brace too with the classy mare Enbihaar. Other victories came from Mark Johnston’s Elarqam, Roger Varian’s Valyrian Steel and Clive Cox’s Tis Marvellous. The disappointment was Varian’s Setarhe who, after finishing second at Royal Ascot to Dandalla, never managed better than third in five subsequent outings.
Putting together a long-term team is harder than it looks. Sometimes early-season form is turned upside down when the weather changes. Sometimes owners, even trainers, get carried away by minor success and start running their horses above their class. Over jumps the easiest thing would be to pick a dozen horses exclusively from the yards of Nicky Henderson, Paul Nicholls, Willie Mullins and Gordon Elliott.
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