Fibs and Flannel, first canter and new colors

Fibs and Flannel, Piste Jaune at Maisons-Laffitte, May 25
In flight

If I was an owner with Elbow Beach, it's true that it was nothing like it is now that I am an Owner, officially approved by and registered with France Galop, and the owner of Fibs and Flannel, by Tobougg out of Cayman Kai mare Queens Jubilee (in the year of the Queen's Jubilee, a sign perhaps), making purchase decisions, ordering my silks, signing contracts, and, yesterday, standing on the mound of grass alongside the piste jaune, waiting for my horse to come blazing up and past us where we take stock of the horse's action, respiratory effort, relative speed and power.

It's where we realized the issue with Elbow Beach that we believed explained her lack of turn of foot in the homestretch. It's where we realized that Fibs is fast. Fast, I hope, enough.

Full reach

When he arrived in the yard in Maisons-Laffitte from Newmarket May 7, I went out to see him the next day and found a horse dripping with muscle in the shoulder and hind quarters, with a nice deep chest. Even I could see that this was a horse built for the mile, 8 furlongs, 1600 meters.

"Up to maybe 2000 here," said my friend and trainer now Gina Rarick, "But, we'll start him at a mile."

Good, consistent milers are rare enough, and it's a good length race to run well here, and he likes the turf, and runs just about as well on the fibersand. There would be plenty of options for him.

"I watched the video of his last two races in England again, and I think he was just losing interest. They are hard on them over there. I think all we have to do," said Gina "is make him happy."

This is the yard to do that, and it's the part that makes it the hardest if you're in the clamining races, with the chance of losing the horse to someone willing to bid higher than the price at which you are willing (or able) to defend. King Driver has a blue plastic soccer ball in a net that can be hung from the wall of his box or held by Agata in a game of tug-of-war, her hand and arm to his teeth and neck.

Everyone gets pets (except the stallion) and company, music during evening stable and individually adapted meals, according to the horses' needs and tastes. The boxes are squeaky clean and fresh, the straw plentiful, the hay tasty, and both are free of dust to bother the throat and lungs.

Owners wield pitchforks and walk their and others' horses, take the news of the yard, show up for each other's races, bring carrots and photos. The gate is always open, except when it is time for the afternoon nap and peace and quiet reign.

The other bit of work was to develop his back muscles and help him heal a sore spot along his spine, just before the croup, from where the saddles in England bothered him. He ran with his head up and his back hollow. Here, he would strengthen his back and learn to run with his head down while carrying a jockey.

Fibs did not move into the yard as the fanciest horse, nor as the most expensive horse, the horse in whom anyone could have the highest hopes and expectations. He arrived from the spring Breeze Up & Horses In Training Sale, Lot N° 35, not the best sale with the best horses. That's in July. But, the sale was taking place, Sebastien was going and returning with horses, and with the departure of Elbow Beach, I was without a horse. I could see what Sebastien had shipped over and if Gina thought anything was worth training, or I could just wait until July.

His race history was good enough; his paper was alright; but, he could be up for sale at the Tattersall's spring sale because there was something developing, something wrong, or not right enough, or because the barn needed to make room for younger, more promising horses that hadn't reached their ceilings yet. Racing is relative; he could be useful in the claimers and handicaps, but only seeing him, watching him move, going over his legs and feeling who is is would tell.

Gina gave the nod; Fibs was a horse who might well do what we hoped, and, so, he stayed in the yard under my patronage as the possibly useful horse, a horse who might bring in more in a claimer than was paid in Newmarket, and his papers and shipping.  A horse who might help me acquire a better horse still, or who would at least work and pay his bills in exchange for good care and the chance to run.

Yesterday, the yard's regard for him climbed a notch the second he passed us, standing alongside the piste jaune.

"He's good," said Gina, sounding, just possibly, agreeably surprised. "He's straight, and he has a large stride." I definitely heard satisfaction.

He'd cantered, what the French call galloping, the speed work, with Hard Way, and Gina turned to Hard Way's two other owners, she herself being the third, as well as his breeder, and pronounced him ready for Longchamp June 11. At that moment, I hope I might be forgiven my selfishness, I only had ears for what she had to say about Fibs, eyes for Fibs. Hard Way, as much as I adore him and am enchanted by his story, seemed a million miles away, somewhere out in Fibs' orbit.

We made our way over the other side of the piste jaune to the trail alongside, the place where Gina asks her questions and finds out what the exercise riders have to say about the horses' performance, while they turn in lazy circles around her, and Ludovic on Hard Way and Agata on Fibs trotted peaceably up toward us, where we waited.

"Il est bon," said Agata, and I got lost behind my camera lens, watching them turn about Gina, half-hearing the conversations around me, and the words He's good. He's good. He's good. Il est bon, il est bon, il est bon turned around and around in my ears.

Later, Agata came up to me in the yard and said, "Il avait encore a donner. Il aurait pu prendre Hard Way à la fin là et vient avec Hard Way devant. Il est bon."

Il est bon, il est bon, il est bon.


You don't let them actually race in speed work, though. Hard Way was the one set to gallop out front, and Agata's job was to gallop Fibs, staying back. Let one get along side another, and you've got a horse race, not a morning speed session.

My silks were ready at Petitspas on the main street in Maisons-Laffitte, making and selling everything you need to train and race a horse, and we headed off to pick them up, my heart a little bit in my throat. I could always change them if I hated them. I had had such a hard time making up my mind, but I didn't want to have to go through that, show myself as anything but decided and knowing my mind, at least for the choice of my colors.

Monsieur greeted us like he always does, and we followed him through the workshop, smelling of leather and full of scales, tools and an assortment of different machines for sewing everything from fabric to leather, where his assistant looked up from where he was working at the long bench along the windows of the courtyard and smiled toward us, to his office, from which he emerged with a smile and a clear plastic bag in his hand. Neatly folded inside were my racing silks. My colors.

I imagined them up on the wall at Deauville or Longchamp. I have no right to, but no one does not imagine this. I saw satiny golden orange and a color like a deep claret wine, so close to "win", shining through. I hardly dared form an opinion, but it seemed generally favorable around me. We drove back to the yard, and Gina pulled into her place in front of the gate.

"Do you want to take the silks home?" she asked.

"You usually keep them, don't you?" It occurred to me she thought I might want to show them to my husband. "Keep them here with all the silks."

"OK, I'll keep them with the others," she said, drawing back her hand and the silks shining in the sunshine through their plastic packaging. We started to cross the street.

"That way there can't be any problem; everything is here and ready."

The trainer brings the silks to the race in the little pouchshe has just for that purpose, leaves them in the cubby near the jockeys' locker room, and brings them back to launder them after the race. We turned to cross the street.

"You don't want to take them into the house?" I said.

"No! Let's take them over to the yard; we always show new silks off to the yard," she added, laughing.

It's true. It is a big moment. New colors coming into a trainer's yard means new business: a new owner, another horse, more racing opportunities and business. There are endless moments to mark and to celebrate in racing, even the sorrier ones, like a race that doesn't go according to expectations, when a jockey doesn't follow his orders or a horse has a bad day against tough competition, and none is to be missed. Ever.

Gina walked down to the barn and ripped open the plastic, turning to hold up the casaque in the bright noon sunshine for everyone's inspection. I watched from the safety of my camera lens. Agata voiced her approval and her surprise at finding that she approved.

"C'est beaucoup mieux en vrai que sur papier!" she pronounced, a huge smile across her face, "Le satin brille et ça change tout!"

I realized she had carefully hidden her fear that the silks would be hideous from me, but because they were shiny, and not just muddy ink on heavy ivory paper, or what it looked like on the simulator on the France Galop site, whichever she had seen, they had saved themselved from being awful, and even pleased.

"J'avais vu les échantillons des tissues chez Petitpas," I offered, by way of hopeful explanation, "alors je savais que ça donnait autre chose que sur l'écran de l'ordi ou papier." I had seen the cloth samples at Petitpas, I explained, so I knew what they would look like. Sort of.

"Et, je voulais que ça brille au soleil, que se soit des couleurs heureuses qui se voient."

She nodded, still smiling, and went to take the silks from Gina and pulled them over her head. I turned to Mark and added, "And I have the horse, as it happens, to go with them." He raised an eyebrow and smiled, nodding Yeah.

It was true; he shines like burnished copper, a bright, shiny centime in the sun, and the colors are perfect for him. It is just another coincidence.

Watching Agata pull the silks into place, I thought, I even have an enthusiastic and beautiful exercise jockey to model them for me, and got back behind the lens. She went to shut Milly's box door against the strong sunshine and heat and mugged for me, laughing and celebrating new colors.

"Il fallait oser le faire, mais c'est bon," she concluded, folding them back into their clear plastic bag and setting it on the bench alongside everything else one needs to care for race horses in Gina's barn. "C'est vraiment bien."

"C'est ça qui compte le plus," I told her, "que tout le monde les apprécie car l'on travaille tous ensemble." The whole yard wears the owners' colors, so it's best, I think, if everyone likes and is proud of them.

I feel like I might be a little bit crazy. I am not the person of whom you think when you think of a thoroughbred race horse owner; I am far from from it, possessing some of the qualities, but lacking the main one, the wealth, but there's something driving me. I don't make a lot of impulsive decisions; I can't afford to, but I am doing this for the experience, for the pleasure of being around these animals and everyone who is also compelled to be around them, for whatever lessons I will learn, and for whatever stories I will have to tell.

Because, you can't know the stories until you live them, and you can't tell what you haven't lived.
....

Fibs

Tattersalls, N° 35

Fibs And Flannel (GB) Ch.G. by Tobougg (IRE) x Queens Jubilee (GB)Consignor: Saville House Stables (W. Musson)

The Tattersalls Guineas Breeze Up and Horses in Training 2012 sale was set to begin at noon in Newmarket, 1 pm in Maisons-Laffitte, and on the edge of Normandy, where I sat in front of my laptop. It wasn't the sale at which we had intended to make a purchase, not being a favored sale, but we hadn't expected to be sending Elbow Beach back to Newmarket, either, which left me, quite unexpectedly and in a terrible irony, without a horse the very day I became an official owner with France Galop.

That Saturday, the vet Jerôme, trainer Gina Rarick, Thierry, Lisa and I stood at the place where Elbow made the noise, and waited for her to gallop past, Agata on board, just behind Guilain on Deep. We held our breath in absolute silence, waiting to listen to Elbow's, and past she shot, but not really on Deep's heals. Jerôme nodded. It was enough for him.

"Oui," he nodded again, looking from Gina to me and meeting my gaze, "j'ai entendu le sifflement. Elle corne."

She was whistling.

And she wasn't finishing her races. Her last time out in Maisons-Laffitte April 16 in the Prix Arreau (photos), she'd been out toward the front coming up the homestretch, and then she seemed to get smaller, receeding back into the pack like a balloon running out of air in super slow motion, almost imperceptibly. Was she slowing, or was everyone else speeding up? She finished far from the win she was here to get, 11th in a field of 13. Only 2 horses crossed the finish line behind her.

I watched from a distance as jockey Fabien Lefebvre dismounted and spoke with Gina after the race, surrounded by the crowd of hopeful supporters who had come to the racetrack to watch Elbow run that day. I knew what he was going to say, and so did Gina. I watched his body language as he described ber behavior, unwilling to enter the gate; we'd all seen it on the big screen. Elbow had tried to desist from starting without a fuss, first backing away from the gate, then shaking her head "no", pulling back steadily, insistently on the lead.

Yes, said the track handlers, You're going in. No, said Elbow. She didn't rear, she didn't throw; she just kept resisting until their combined force, hands joined behind her hind quarters, Fabien pulling on her tail, overcame her resistance. But, it wasn't just orneryness. Watching her,and having watched her other races, I was convinced she had her good reasons and knew she knew no way to tell everyone pulling, then pushing, other than by resisting.

She broke fine and ran a good race, until they were right in front of the grandstand.

I watched Fabien describe, gesturing with his hands, lowering and shaking his head, lips pressed together, how she just dropped back coming up to the post. It wasn't merely that she lacked turn of foot, which she was supposed to possess in abundance, coming from a family of winners and here to collect her win to make her programmed offspring more valuable in the yearling sales; she lacked the breath to accelerate and make her attack. Of all the horses out there, it was Elbow who lacked the ability to suck in enough oxygen to sustain her effort and go for that final one to overtake her competition and win.

We didn't know this yet, but we suspected it.

There was no way not to suspect the possibility of a wind issue now that she was fit, which she wasn't when she first arrived from England, having cooled her heals 10 days in a horse walker, waiting for the weather to permit a channel crossing, and that after having been out of racing training since her last race, October 10, 2011, 3 months before. She stayed back in Maisons-Laffitte when the others left for Cagnes-sur-Mer, and only joined Gina and them in her assigned box there when she'd had more preparation, and when I flew down for her first race, February 2, and she came in 4th, we were thrilled. Here was the proof; this filly was scarcely in race form, and she'd got a 4th place finish and brought home a check to pay her oats and training. All we had to do was keep up the work, except her next two finishes were 4th and 5th place, when by all rights should have been blowing past the others, and we weren't seeing the turbo kick in. More worryingly, Agata was reporting that she was making a noise at 1000 meters in her twice weekly morning gallops.

I thought about all that while I watched Fabien describe the race, looking disconcerted and dismayed for the first time. In the noise of a race, hooves pounding the turf, jockeys shouting, he wouldn't have heard the noise, but he felt its effect. The worst, he said, the thing that puzzled him the most, he told us, was her behavior before the race; she didn't want to race, and she hadn't the last time, either.

Later, at the Pur Sang for beers, we talked again about Elbow's performances, coming around to "the noise" and the wind issue.

"I think we need to get her scoped," I said, sounding every bit the horsewoman I am not, and then we went all through it again before Gina nodded.

"I'll call Jerôme and let's get her scoped."

Jerôme, as it happened, said that there was still time that day to do it, since she had raced just a few hours before, and we met at the yard.

The endoscopy of her pharynx showed little, except for a slight asymmetry of the cartilage of the larynx. Enough, however, to consider doing an endoscopy during fast work. That said, not being her owners on paper and a mounted endoscopy being costly, Jerôme suggested coming during her next gallops to listen for the noise, confirmation of which, that Saturday morning in April, was enough to send her back to her owner for further testing, and leave me without a horse in the yard.

I didn't go, although I thought I would, to see her off.

This is what sometimes happens in racing, like in jumping, and you have to get used to it or leave the game. We are their stewards, the time they are in the stables and working for us; we love them, care for them, feeding and grooming them well, exercise them, and even play with them (ask King about his soccer ball in a net), but when it's time for the horse to move on, move on to an appropriate next place and owner he must. I did think, though, of Elbow the morning she stepped onto the van for the journey back to Newmarket, and I believe that were she to come back to Maisons-Laffitte, she'd remember us and be glad enough to see us again.

We were good to her, as all owners, trainers, lads and exercise riders ought to be. She received the care she required and was raced with consideration. She got her hay, oats and water, and would have received any therapeutic treatment she needed, but nothing as a matter of course, and now it would be up to her owner to make the decisions in her racing career, depending on what the tests would show.

Elbow, before her last race in France at Maisons-Laffitte

I said good-bye to Elbow Beach across the kilometers from my home on the edge of Normandy, and suddenly the July sales seemed terribly far away. Gina hadn't been enthusiastic about the breeze up and in training sale at Newcastle in a couple of weeks, but just as suddenly, whatever would be up for offer seemed more interesting, and our eye turned to the 3-year-old colt Benbecula by Motivator (who, like Surrey Storm, calls the 2000 Arc winner Montjeu papa) out of Shirley Heights mare Isle of Flame after watching the N° 6 Motivator colt Esles (out of Dehere mare Resquilleuse and ridden by Christophe Soumillon) charge past his competition and the finish line in the 5th race of the day at Saint-Cloud May 1. We were watching from a table in the owners and trainers lounge, and Sebastien grabbed the Tattersalls catalog lying on the table by his hand.

"There's a Motivator horse in there?" I asked.

Oui, Sebastien nodded, riffling through the pages as fast as Esles had gone through the competition, and pointed to a pedigree "There."

The horse's name was Benbecula, and the dams had produced a good amount of black type. I watched Sebastien confirm mentally his place on his short list, and I made a mental note of my own to speak with Gina once she returned from wherever she had gone.

That we were interested in this colt was, in hindsight, less surprising by a great deal than that we thought we could ever possibly acquire him. My budget was small, and ought to have been a good deal smaller, and he had two 2nd place finishes in 4 starts. Still, he had no wins yet, and it was April. Perhaps no one was paying attention.

The first lots to go at Newcastle May 3 were encouraging, as horses sold for under 5,000 guineas, some not making reserve at just 5,500 or 5,800 guineas, and then came a bay filly, Cape Safari, who got a top bid of 37,000 guineas and didn't make her reserve.

"Oh oh, here we go now," I typed, watching the bids climb.

"Yup," came Gina's reply on facebook messenger, "The really good stuff sells for much more."

We were watching the live sales on the Tattersalls site and talking by chat, and Gina had Sebastien on his mobile by text message. She'd be calling him when Ben came into the ring. Then, four horses sold for 3,500 gns and less. My hope and courage returned, until N° 28, bay gelding Knockgraffen Lad by Forestry out of Miss Dahlia, turned a couple times around the sales ring and the bids were already soaring over 20,000 gns. The words "28 is obviously worth something!" appeared in the little window.

"No joke."

The top bid was 34,000 gns; he didn't make his reserve; the sale went on, and then another horse in which we knew Sebastien was interested, N° 41, entered the ring and was knocked down for 10,500 gns.

"We'll never get Ben for 8,000," I typed.

"No, I don't think so," came the reply.

"Not even 10,000."

I bit my nail to smooth off the ragged edge I'd left from biting it and typed "Did Seb buy?"

"No, I'm sure he didn't get that one. Too much.
He bought 35, though, too."

I looked up 35, 5-year-old chestnut gelding Fibs and Flannel by Tobougg out of Queens Jubilee that went for a reasonable price. Lots of starts, a regular performer with three wins.

"What do you think of him?" I asked.

"I don't care for Tobougg."

I put Fibs and Flannel out of my mind, with an asterisk. We were nearing number 50, Benbecula, who, to make a short story even shorter, was out of my range before the call even went through. If you care to make on offer, however, you may: he didn't make his reserve when the bidding ended at 45,000 gns. We weren't, it appeared, the only ones paying attention, nor were we likely the only ones to have come across the blurb on him in spankthebookie.com.

I took scant comfort in having my horse sense (alright, Seb's and Gina's) confirmed, and, I ruminated, at least I didn't have to deal with the ache of losing him by a couple hundred lousy guineas. Seb had bought two horses, Fibs and a horse who went for less still. Gina sent the photos. In them, neither looked like much, but then again, the angles were bad. No, Gina said, the first one wasn't all that compromised by Seb's cell phone photography; the one to look at was N° 35, Fibs and Flannel, and I set to thinking about it.

Ludo on Fibs and Flannel, behind Seb on Sabys Gem and Agata on King, Rond Poniatowski, May 8

I headed to the yard to look him over, stood in the Rond Poniatowski with Gina and watched him trot, then canter, did yards of mental calculations, consulted my instincts and measured my mettle, and yesterday I made my decision and we fêted it with two bottles of champagne between Gina, Seb, yard owner Chantal, and myself (Gina's husband Tim stuck with scotch, just like their friend Brian, who we waved down as he drove by; it isn't difficult to make a merry drinks party in Maisons-Laffitte). 

My husband wasn't divorcing me for it (I actually suspect he is finding all this rather intriguing, despite his normally conservative constitution), and as they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Sole owner of this red gelding, dripping with muscle in his shoulders and hind quarters -- needing to build up the back -- and built to run a mile, with four legs in training, I am venturing it all. As Gina says, all we have to do is make him happy, and he'll run for us. They've been hard on him, and we'll make him happy.

Let us hope that this is fun. It might at least provide moments of mirth in the retelling, over cans of cat food at meals in my diminished retirement, because, suddenly, all I want is a horse; my kingdom for a horse.

God help me, and Inshallah.
....

Groomed and in his luxury suite, Fibs waits for dinner

For more photos of Fibs and Flannel, click here.