Horse Trader: Robert Sangster and the Rise and Fall of the Sport of Kings. Nick Robinson

eye of Mr PP Hogan.

      By now Robert was fed up to his back teeth with playing golf in Marbella, which he had been doing intermittently for several months. He was fed up with the constant sun, and he was fed up with life as an expatriate. He considered moving the family to Ireland, but that might have landed him with worse tax problems than he had in England. Instead he decided to go to America for the sales, and upon his return to take Christine and have a careful look at houses on the Isle of Man, that curious thirty-mile-long island which sits bang in the middle of the Irish Sea, seventy-five miles from both Liverpool and Dublin. He knew the island well having spent numerous childhood holidays there with Vernon and Peggy, who had owned a holiday home there for some years, and he thought that both of his parents would approve of such a move. Before he went to America he called his dad and told him that on a clear day he could probably see the Royal Liverpool links through the telescope of the Royal Douglas Golf Club. ‘You’ll never know when I might be watching,’ he chuckled. ‘But I miss playing golf with you, Dad …’

      It was now May and Vincent had secured the services of the man he regarded as the best bloodstock agent in the world, the former barrister Mr Tom Cooper, who ran the Irish branch of the British Bloodstock Agency. Every year Tom checked out the yearlings in the massive horse-breeding areas of America – Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Maryland, a vast area more than double the size of the British Isles, which involved thousands of miles of travelling. He and Vincent had been friends for many years, and Tom had first led him to Larkspur, the first Derby winner to be trained at Ballydoyle in 1962. The task was daunting, and Vincent wanted an exclusive first look at Tom’s ratings. He knew how meticulous the agent was, taking with him a small tape recorder, making detailed notes of every well-bred, good-looking horse which took his formidable eye. ‘When you are planning to spend the kind of money we have in mind,’ said Vincent, ‘you want to seize every piece of professional assistance you can, from people whose judgment you can really trust. Tom was going to become “our man”.’

      Back on the home front, Robert was watching an interesting scenario. He had a horse at Ballydoyle which had been there for almost as long as he could remember. His name was Boone’s Cabin, by Forli out of an unraced mare called Stay at Home, which is what her son usually did on big race days. Boone’s Cabin was now five years old, a powerful sprinting type and a full-brother to the high-class racehorse and modest stallion Home Guard. In his time Boone’s Cabin had won four or five races and run well in a few others, but never in the best company. Robert had wondered at the end of his three-year-old career whether Vincent would say quietly, ‘Sell him, Robert,’ as he did at other such inauspicious moments. But the trainer felt he had not yet ‘got to the horse’, and he would like more time to do so.

      Nothing much changed when Boone’s Cabin was four. He was still below top class and again Robert waited to be told: ‘Sell him, now.’ But again Vincent was thoughtful. ‘I’d like just a little bit more time, Robert,’ was all he said. And so Boone’s Cabin went into his fifth year and, sure enough, he won a nice little race at the Curragh, and then scrambled home by a short head from a horse called Willy Willy in a four-horse race for the Ballyogan Stakes at Leopardstown. As form goes, it was not bad, but it was not good enough to stand him as a thoroughbred stallion, anywhere outside of a banana republic. Robert privately thought it was about time he cashed his chips and sold Boone’s Cabin to the nearest bloodstock agent who represented such a banana republic. The Ballyogan Stakes often amounts to very little, but it was supposed to be Ireland’s top sprint and that might just be good enough to get him sold to a moderate foreign power.

      Vincent, however, thought differently. ‘I’d say he’s just about straight now,’ he said patiently. ‘We’ll take him to Royal Ascot and he might just surprise you. I’ve always thought a lot of him, but he’s just taken a little bit of time to come to himself.’

      Robert who had been paying training fees for the biggest part of four years now considered that was quite modestly phrased. But to Ascot they went. Boone’s Cabin was in the highly competitive six-furlong Wokingham Stakes. Thanks to his victory over Willy Willy, he was shouldering ten stone, one hundred and forty pounds on the handicap, the highest weight it is possible to carry in an English flat race. Not since Trappist in 1878 had any horse carried anything approaching ten stone to victory in the Wokingham. And even Trappist had carried four pounds less than Robert’s horse.

      Boone’s Cabin, ridden by Lester Piggott against nineteen hard-trained rivals, won it by three parts of a length, with a blistering display of speed and courage, striking the front with a furlong to run, and belting home boldly, under his huge weight, in the style of a sprinting champion. It was a very fast time, and represented one of the most stupendous weight-carrying performances seen at Ascot. Robert Sangster could not believe his eyes. ‘Some of those Forlis are very fast, you know,’ said Vincent chattily as they made their way to the winners’ enclosure. ‘He’s a nice horse. Just needed a little bit of time. I always thought he had a nice race in him.’ Boone’s Cabin never ran like that again, losing the July Cup to the crack French filly, Lianga, but the Wokingham stamped him as a stallion and he was sold very well to stand in Australia. Robert put another pile of cash into his pocket, and pondered thoughtfully over the indisputable fact that the little genius from Tipperary had done it again.

      And now it was back to work. Tom Cooper’s report had arrived on Vincent’s desk. He called John Magnier instantly. They pored over the pedigrees, marking down those yearlings they must see, those they would get Phonsie to check first, and those they would never see, the ones which did not have the pedigree to justify themselves at stud, even if they won the Derby. They were now working on the opening steps of a ten-fifteen year plan: a plan which must be given time to work and to mature, time to produce the correct fillies and future broodmares, time to put the stallions in place. It takes six years minimum to establish a top sire. Robert thought the earliest their buying programme would finish would be the year 1985 or perhaps 1986.