Coltrane

"We're enjoying it enormously." Those are words racing needs to hear from every owner.  In the case of Mick and Janice Mariscotti, who have been in the game long enough to have experienced both good days and bad, they know to appreciate a decent one when he comes along, and in Zavateri they look to have just that. "He's by far and away the best two-year-old we've ever had," says Mick of the unbeaten young son of Without Parole, who now has the G2 July Stakes and G2 Vintage Stakes...

A special aspect of British racing is the existence of some spectacular country estates devoted solely to the purpose of breeding and training racehorses. For anyone with a love of the turf, names such as Kingsclere, Manton and Beckhampton have resonated down the years.  We owe a debt of gratitude to those who ensure that they continue in this modern era, with their swathes of land so attractive to developers and their historic buildings so expensive to maintain. Andrew Balding's base at Park House Stables has subsumed its village's name...

There are undoubtedly many good reasons to have a rounded life with interests beyond the breeding, training, buying and selling of a supreme equine athlete who can run faster than his contemporaries. Those of us whose waking hours are mostly consumed by one or more of these bloodstock industry pursuits can rightly be accused of not getting out more, particularly at this time of year. But when the daily non-racing headlines revolve around the British economy in freefall, hurricanes and floods decimating parts of the world, and President Putin looming...