The inside track on racing syndicates

Billy Connolly once declared that Scotland had only two seasons: June and winter. Perversely, though, just as the northern swallows are setting their alarm clocks and checking departure times for Cape Town and Johannesburg, it has become the Oakley tradition to head for the Isle of Mull. In recent years the accompanying essentials, Mrs Oakley, a case of good wine, long wellies and a surf-addicted flat-coat retriever, have been supplemented by author Felix Francis sending me in late August his latest forthcoming ‘Dick Francis novel’. 

Racing’s continuance owes much to partnerships and syndicates. They have spread the joyous experience of racehorse ownership to many who, denied the background of a family hedge fund or a hefty legacy, could never before have contemplated funding a bouncing Richard Hannon two-year-old or a craftily campaigned Fergal O’Brien jumper. Researching that benefit I had no sooner ascertained from the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) that spread among Britain’s 14,000 registered owners there are no fewer than 890 syndicates than there plopped on to my doorstep the latest Francis thriller, Syndicate, about the colourful travails of a racehorse syndicate manager.

Felix acknowledges that his role model for the fictional Chester Newton (Newton’s amorous exploits apart, one imagines) is Harry Herbert, chairman and managing director of the Highclere syndicate whose 500 or so members pay between £5,000 and £40,000 a share for hopefully top-class horses like this season’s phenomenal sprinter Believing. Harry also runs the Royal Ascot Racing Club, which meant that when Motivator won in 2005 he had more owners than any Derby winner in history – 230 of them. The Middleham Park syndicates that have been going since 1995 have accumulated more than 1,500 winners, while at the other end of the scale are microshare schemes which you can buy into for £30 or £40.