-d1c0-5234-9ba7-874afa242ce6">
HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 1993
Copyright © Patrick Robinson and Nick Robinson
Patrick Robinson and Nick Robinson assert the moral right to be identified as the authors of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication.
Source ISBN: 9780002551328
Ebook Edition © JUNE 2016 ISBN: 9780008193379
Version: 2016-06-20
To Joe Thomas and Northern Dancer.
They are both gone now, but they left behind an
eternal flame in the Vale of Tipperary.
Throughout this narrative there are frequent references to huge sums of money, some of them in US dollars and some of them in pounds sterling. We did not attempt to convert these into one single currency, which is the standard editorial practice, because the sums – such as the $10.2 million Keeneland yearling – were often such well-known figures that conversion would have been misleading and almost certainly inaccurate since exchange rates can vary by the hour. A sterling rate of 1.75, for instance, would have converted to ‘the £5,828,571.40 Keeneland yearling’. This would plainly have been absurd. The yearling was bred in the USA, the bidding was in dollars and the colt was paid for in dollars. Thus, when in America we have worked in dollars, and when in England or Ireland we have used pounds – occasionally Irish ones, when a stallion involved an Irish-trained horse going to Coolmore Stud in Tipperary.
There is also the occasional mention of the old-fashioned ‘guineas’ (one pound and one shilling). This is still used at English bloodstock auctions and, where appropriate, we have utilized this measurement. The title of the one-mile classics remains in the old racehorse currency – the 2000 Guineas and the 1000 Guineas. These do not, however, bear any relationship to the modern prize money for these races, which is nowadays over £100,000.
Contents
8 The Soft Steps of the Bedouin
9 ‘Would You Sell Him for $30 Million?’
17 The Magic Touch of the Irish
