Barney Curly

Tanlic

Tanlic

Senior Jockey
Joined
Dec 6, 2011
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Bangkok Thailand
To some a hero to some a rouge Barney Curly (73) is hanging up his boots.

Personally I'm definitely in the hero camp.

Barney was the "Touch Master" an expert at allowing a horse to find his own peak and not afraid to smash into one when it came right.

Never really had the pleasure other than a quick hello goodby but I got to know Andrew "Sammy" Stringer quite well even bought a very nice horse through him one which we sold on for a nice profit.

He praised Barney to the high heavens as I'm sure others who really knew him did.

Seems he never missed you if you crossed him which was blatantly obvious when he set about that ungrateful lump of lard McCririck in this classic.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfPpBpDaSXE

There's a lot more to the man than meets the eyes his charity DAFA has helped loads of kids in Zambia get an education. It takes a very special person to dedicate his time to helping others.

Barney's Audio Reports on British racing are on U-tube and are well worth a listen. The eye openers on how we get robbed daily by the big bookies and some of the goings on that are a lot worse than someone landing a touch.

Happy retirement
 
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OTB said:
He's a cheat. Simple as.
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is that unusual though in horse racing?..how many non cheats..as in cheat in the sense you suggest about BC ...are there in the game..? 50%..40%..just him?

and is it cheating?..or is the system at fault?..or is racing just so easy to "cheat" that it will always be riddled with it
 
You are one of those take out merchants!!and you!you were an underachiever!!
 
It's exactly the same as a trainer saying "The horse will tell me when he's ready"

Barney trained horses on the racecourse all his life and his jockeys didn't need to stop them as he always left plenty to work on. Sooner or later a horse will show marked improvement after a run and without having been pushed he will come to peak fitness.......When that happened that's when Barney decided whether to have a punt or not.

I simply don't see why anyone would think that was a laughable statement unless of course they know nothing about racing but judging by most of your posts you seem to which made me a bit angry.............wrong side of the bed mate don't let it bother you
 
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He's a wrong 'un albeit a very successful one because our authorities have been so soft for years. He'd be in prison if he trained in Hong Kong.

The article in the RP by Richard Birch was a joke and typical of the rag defending these types rather than standing up to them. When he basically said how Tusculum's win was a stroke of genius, I nearly threw up. My nan could have won with that off the mark they'd got it down to, with the assistance of the handicapper.

I think the Yellow Sam coup was a stroke of genius in it's execution but overall he's been bad for the game. To say he was the punters pal is bollocks, he ruined markets where he had runners and put people off betting in them thus weakening markets.
 
I don't think it's right to call Barney a wrong un -the good he has done outside racing far outweighs anything else he was involved with.
 
You only need to look at Lance Armstrong to see the good work you can do for charity despite being a shady character in your sporting life.
 
In recent times one Curley modus operandi was to find horses which once upon a time had shown very decent form in countries not taken seriously by British punters, such as Germany or Italy, but whose form had deteriorated. He was buying them cheap and gave them all the time they needed to be ready for a fto win in the worst races he could find in England. Natually they were gambled but it was perfectly fair, even if it didn't stop people squealing cheat.
 
Declan Murphy, Frankie Dettori, Johnny Murtagh, Tom Queally amongst others all have reason to be thankful to Barney Curley.
He sourced a lot of good horses for the Dickinsons in his time and seemed to be held in high enough esteem among the racing fraternity.
That he is an enigma is his own business.
 
Tanlic said:
It's exactly the same as a trainer saying "The horse will tell me when he's ready"
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That is a term that trainers use to describe the signs they see that show a horse is ready.

an expert at allowing a horse to find his own peak
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Is a phrase I have not heard before and sounds like a (humorous) euphemism for a non trier. When he had a winner there was no clue from previous form. The horse was not reaching a 'natural peak' plain for all to see. It generally took half the track to pull up after the finish line when it won (One that spencer won twice on in Galway in the same week springs to mind) after a run of duck eggs. For every punter who was on there where twenty that where n't. He drove people away from racing and fixed the 'bent' image in peoples minds .What ever else he did/does he was no friend of racing.
 
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