My Week - Coneygree

(as imagined by Jonathan Garratt)

Monday
I had a nice Summer break thanks. But now it’s all work, work, work. Have you ever noticed how, even when you win a Gold Cup, you’re hardly ever allowed to eat out of it?

Apparently I’m too fat anyway – for every bowl of oats I have to do an extra gallop. I’m supposed to be getting fit for my first outing of the season, which could be at Carlisle on 1st November. It’s one of those graduation races which means that, even though I’m the best horse in the country, most of the other good horses won’t be allowed to run because it’s only for horses in their first or second season over fences.

Tuesday

It’s in the media today... They (the boss and other humans) want to win another Gold Cup, but this time it’s got to be a Hennessy one – like the one Carruthers (my half brother) won a few years ago at Newbury. You can fit a lot more oats in it.

Wednesday

The nice people from Jockey Club Racecourses have been in touch to ask why I’m not trying to scoop their million pound bonus for winning the Betfair Chase, King George VI Chase and Cheltenham Gold Cup in a single season. It’s very kind of them, but really – oats are all I need.

Thursday

Apparently you can buy a lot of oats for a million pounds, we might enter that race at Haydock after all.

Don Cossack is running at Punchestown today. The bookies make him 8/1 for the 2016 Cheltenham Gold Cup, the same price as me - Neighhhh. I’m more worried about Vautour – he’s just 4/1 for the Gold Cup and he’s only had three runs over fences. I hope he doesn’t turn up at Carlisle. Perhaps he won't know where it is. Come to that, does anyone know where Carlisle is?

Friday

I’ve been told that Carlisle is just a bit further north than Cartmel – I’ve always wanted to visit Cartmel; could someone tell the boss?

Saturday

Never mind the million pound bonus for winning three major races with a combined distance of nearly ten miles, the horses at Ascot today don’t have to jump any obstacles and are competing for more than four million pounds. And get this: some of them don’t even have to run a whole mile!

As the boss says, it’s not all about the money – it’s the romance that counts… and the oats.

Sunday

We all won loads of money when Clever Cookie won the stayers race at Ascot yesterday, so I’m going to buy some more oats. Clever Cookie is trained by Peter Niven who is probably more familiar with Carlisle than Ascot, but he was tipped in the Cartmel blog-spot – so we dived in. Nice place Cartmel. Hope to visit one day…