Diary: Henry Brooke gives new meaning to being off the bridle
Great rides usually don’t get acknowledged unless the jockey wins, but Henry Brooke’s effort on Cool Baranca at Kelso warrants a special mention.
Over and out: the Ireland cricket team outplayed and out-sledged the England team in the World Cup Photo: GETTY IMAGES
7:08PM BST 28 Mar 2011
A brief summary – the mare was still in with an each-way chance when she ran out at the last flight of hurdles – does not begin to tell the story.
Brooke, 20, is a promising 7lb claimer attached to Donald McCain’s yard with 17 winners this season. He was just moving Cool Baranca into contention when she made a howler at the fourth-last and fired the jockey over her head. She found an extra leg to save herself and, in the process of defying gravity to save himself, Brooke not only lost his irons but managed to push the bridle over the mare’s head.
Critically, however, he managed to keep hold of the bridle – if he had let go it would have probably tripped her up. An inventory at this stage of what he had – tangled bridle in his left hand and whip in his right – and what he didn’t have – irons, steering or brakes – would have made uncomfortable reading had he been able to stop and think about it. His immediate future looked bleak let alone his continued participation in the contest.
Upsides him, Graham Lee shouted “well sat” while back in the Kelso weighing room there was a division in opinion as to what his next move should be; old jockeys were muttering to themselves that he should try and pull up or even bail out, while the cavalier young guns were roaring on his futile bravery.
In the saddle – not a totally accurate description of things – Brooke, with effectively no feet and no hands, had two sharpish left-hand bends and three hurdles still to negotiate but, whether this was a good thing or not, Cool Baranca had regained not only her composure but her competitive instinct and was right back in the firing line.
Waving his whip furiously around her head with his right hand, like someone conducting Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture on speed, to get her to turn at the bend, he not only got her round both corners and over the next two flights, but kept the game mare right in contention.
However, going to the last flight – an island hurdle was always going to be a problem – she was given the gentlest of nudges by one of the other runners and Cool Baranca, who had run a lot on the Flat so probably wondered what the hurdles were doing blocking her path anyway, rather sweetly ran around it but, of her own accord, rejoined the race to the line.
By this time the heroic Brooke had given up trying to ride a finish, but the mare looks a good thing next time out – with a bridle.
BOWLED OVER
Michael Caulfield, the former chief executive of the Professional Jockeys Association who is now a sports psychologist, has not long returned from the Cricket World Cup. He was helping the ICC with the positive attitude of some of the associate nations, which included Canada, Kenya, the Netherlands, who should have beaten England, and Ireland, who famously did beat England.
According to him, it seems Ireland not only outplayed England but – and you’d half expect this from a nation well known for its blarney – they out-sledged them too. An Irish batsman who had been hitting the English bowlers to all parts of the ground, scrambled a single off an accurate yorker from our best bowler. When he got to the non-striker’s end he congratulated his adversary. “Well bowled, mate,” he said.
The English bowler, who was thoroughly frustrated by this stage, replied moodily: “You wouldn’t know what a ******* good ball was.”
“Well,” replied the Irish batsman, “I should do by now, you’ve bowled enough bad ones.”
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