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Everyone else decamps to the beach, Waitrose is all but deserted, back home you can open your French window on a fine sunny Hampshire day and hear a pin drop, wall-to-wall racing, there is literally nothing not to like.

So nice I'm considering buying their Cherry Compote next. I always did belong in a gentler world.

A combination from Heaven, I'll warrant. That is all.

Over 1m1f at Pimlico (not the one between Victoria station and The Thames) tonight. Can't wait - but don't have a time machine to hand, so will have to.

IIRC back in the day 6f 2yo races didn't commence until 1st June (often starting with the Woodcote Stakes on Epsom Downs), 7f ones didn't start until 1st July, Nursery Handicaps didn't start until 1st August and 1m (or the few for juveniles over further) races didn't start until 1st September...

I first remember watching the race in 1978. IIRC Jellaby stood in a hole and unseated Brian Taylor a furlong out and Don sidestepped him to win. It was once open to 3yos, but not now. Newbury is half an hour from me and I was there to see Frankel win it. And Farhh the next year, who was...

In case any fellow baby boomers ever wonder why we are all so collectively messed up - get a load of the kind of stuff they had us watching as children (love it tbf):

They've divided the 5f handicap at Beverley on Tuesday. Good to Firm now and there was sure to be a monster advantage to low draws in a maximum field. "Devastated" doesn't even come close. It's going to take a while for me to come to terms with this.

I'm very much looking forward to this card which features the Poule D'Eassai Des Pouliches (French 1,000 Guineas), Poule D'Essai Des Poulains (French 2,000 Guineas) and the 1m2f Prix Saint-Alary which I'd say is their equivalent of the Musidora Stakes. I think a trip to Waitrose for French fish...

I just home (I left after the 7.30) from a very pleasant evening at Kempton Park AW. The weather was wonderful.

I've always been tight with money, and now I've reached an age where what I call "age inflation syndrome" (an inability to judge modern prices in a modern context - "How much? Why, in 1984....) has kicked in, I am doing the most home cooking I've done since my student days. I've knocked up a...

Rebels Romance beating Elegant Man inbetween Group 1 victories, the subsequent 2,000 Guineas winner - it's not all Class 6 Handicaps at the Sunbury venue.

It's the Sagaro Stakes today and it takes me back to 1977, the year I first properly got into racing, the French stayers' third Gold Cup and imo one of Peter O'Sullevan's greatest commentary lines:

"Better than the final finishing position might suggest" could be the apposite cliche of choice.

No words (rare for me).

On Friday there are seven pattern races at Churchill Downs, two of them Grade 1s, including the 1m1f Kentucky Oaks. Two of the many runners of interest to me are Hard To Justify and Just F Y I - both 3yo daughters of Justify. A win for either - or both - would put the kybosh on my fledgling...

One of my favourite days of the year next Saturday - the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket and the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs. Though I'm fortunate enough to have double-digit odds about City Of Troy ante-post, I am less convinced than some that he is a moral certainty. I don't think he'd want...

....well, Irish for betting purposes. Signed Ian O'Davies

It's Whitbread Day, I live in Hampshire, it's gone 10am and it's still only 7 degrees! I didn't leave the frozen grim North all those years ago for THIS. I want (Tiramisu) ice cream weather and I want it now.

I have spent the entire week searching since joining and I cannot find a thread about Waitrose Tiramisu, or Waitrose itself, come to that. I find this perplexing as it's really rather nice and the supermarket is a very pleasant environment in which to shop (well, my local branch is) and really...