African Pursuits – and some closer to home

By Ian Carnaby

I first fell in love with selling races at around the time Richmond Charters Sturdy and Les Hall, both now departed, were in their prime. I cannot say I made an overall profit, though there were certainly some memorable days.

Hall was something of a legend in and around Southampton, being based just up the road near Winchester. He was quite capable of winning races well above selling level, of course, and once completed a four-timer at a big York meeting. Ashurst Wonder won the Stewards’ Cup for him, having formerly been with Sturdy, and Candid Picture turned up at a big price now and then. A good old pro, Candid Picture moved on to Basil Foster in the north and landed a handicap at 20 to 1 under top weight at Stockton. He also had his picture taken for the papers with Davy Jones of the Monkees on top. Happy days.

To a degree, Les ‘telegraphed’ his selling plate winners because they were dropped in class and he would employ a top-class lightweight to ride - Dennis ‘Slasher’ McKay in later years. He didn’t bother running horses in sellers all the time if that was their true grade, he just dropped them in once and had a bet.

There have been powerful, ‘classier’ yards where the trainer was most reluctant to drop into the bottom grade under any circumstances. When it happened, you needed to be on, even at very short prices. Sir Gordon Richards won a seller at Brighton one day and Herbert Blagrave, who owned about half of Reading, dropped the one-eyed Striker into a mile seller at Salisbury where he won by 15 lengths in the hands of Roger Wernham.

But Sturdy, based at Shrewton on Salisbury Plain, where Bob Sievier prepared Sceptre to win four Classics, was as clever as anyone because he encouraged the belief that some of his horses were thoroughly moderate and suitable only for selling races when they were actually capable of winning in higher grade. And he would send them the length of the country to do the business, Golden Passenger at Newcastle being a good example.

Naturally, some were just ordinary platers and it was through watching them carefully that I realised just how dreadful races at this level can be. In the mid 1970s, when David Elsworth was assistant trainer at Shrewton, No Camping ran quite well to the far turn in a novices’ hurdle at Newbury but was beaten miles in the end. Yet he was still capable of winning a poor seller at Southwell next time, with Colin Brown on board, at 5 to 1. Sturdy was a quirky character, he was suffering with a heavy cold that morning and had forgotten to lay on a horse-box. The story goes (and both Elsworth and Brown confirm it) that a butcher’s lorry had to be summoned at short notice.

I have seen some extraordinary sums spent at the auction after sellers, especially valuable two-year old events at Newmarket and York a few years ago. Neville Callaghan would target those and put Pat Eddery up, and it was nothing for people to bid 18,000 guineas or whatever. I never really understood it because, if you target a seller in the first place, you are admitting the horse is no great shakes. Sure, you’d like him or her back, but you’re not going to bid 18,000 guineas.

These winners invariably disappointed afterwards and seldom made up into decent three-year olds. But racecourses loved valuable sellers because they keep half of the difference between the opening bid, often 3,000 guineas, and the final selling price. But you don’t see many bottom-grade races with attractive prize-money these days, so spirited bidding for (supposedly) better-quality winners is comparatively rare.

Morrison’s runner looked a virtual certainty

I am fond enough of sellers to sponsor one at Brighton - September 3 this year - and I am a minor authority on this type of race at the track. I may have mentioned that Martin Pipe told me Highbury Legend would win my race a few years ago but the horse turned out to be not so much a Thierry Henry, more a Perry Groves and was passed up the hill by Modest Hope, rated 26.

Anyway, I was sitting in a wine bar off Whiteladies Road in Bristol a couple of weeks ago, trying to sort out the Brighton seller, and I made African Pursuits a virtual certainty. Trained by Hughie Morrison, who does not have runners in sellers, he had finished fifth twice in better company and a visor was fitted for the first time. The others were truly desperate and I even managed to get the best price as the opening even-money became 4 to 5.

Well, he won. Quite easily in the end, as it happens, though he clearly thought about it at least once and a friend of mine who knows all about these things told me 10 to 1 in running was available on the exchanges. Brighton sellers are like that, you see, they really are.

Stone the crows and starve the lizards, Ron Huggins, he of Double Trigger fame, bid 6,800 guineas for him. He should have rung me up because I could have saved him every last penny. And that is true as things stand because, when Jamie Poulton ran him in a non-seller under top weight, blinkers instead of a visor, over the same course and distance a few days ago he came fourth and there was no prize-money for that. The Racing Post napped him, though the 6 to 4 they predicted soon became 11 to 4 on course. And the thing is, one of those he’d beaten in the seller, Hester Brook, finished in front of him this time. This small essay should tell you everything you need to know about Brighton sellers, though I am available for consultation, my fee the usual bottle of Chablis outside some trattoria where we can watch the world go by.

I told my wife some of the story, including the Ron Huggins bit. “I used to go out with him”, she said, matter of factly.

Which must be the better part of 40 years ago, I suppose, although you don’t like to ask, do you? So I didn’t.