ROA Forum
MAGICAL MOMENTS with ROA member Nick Rhodes
By ’eck he’s good! Eeh Bah Gum and Jamie Gormley take the apprentice handicap at York’s Ebor meeting
T
here couldn’t have been a more fittingly-named horse to round off another smashing Ebor meeting at York than Eeh Bah Gum, and he was a popular winner too, starting a well-backed 7-1 chance for the £70,000 apprentices’ handicap, the final race of the four-day meeting. There could have been no punter, however, quite as thrilled as the horse’s owner Nick Rhodes, who 54 years after first imagining what it would be like to own a winner at the Ebor meeting, was actually experiencing it. “I was born in York and on August 20, 1964 my parents first took me to York races, and I picked my first winner in the Gimcrack, Double Jump,” he says. “From that day on I dreamed of owning my own horse, hoping that one day too I would have a winning horse at that famous York festival. Fifty-four years later my dream became a reality.” Rhodes, who is Divisional Chairman of New Homes Mortgage Helpline – “mortgage broking in the new-build industry” – is fairly new to ownership, his first experience of getting involved with racehorses coming five years ago when joining a Hambleton Racing syndicate with wife Lena. “We had interests in five horses through Kevin Ryan and David O’Meara,” he says. “Travelling up to the yards reminded me how beautiful my birthplace was, and we subsequently moved to Helmsley. “Hooked by the excitement of horseracing, we decided to go it on our own to have the full and ultimate experience. “Syndicates are the ideal way of experiencing a taste of what
owning a racehorse entails, but we now wanted to experience the full journey by choosing our own horse, designing our own silks, choosing the trainer and, subsequently with the trainer, choosing the jockey, track, distance, etc.” He continues: “One day when visiting friends at the Cliff Stud in Helmsley we were taken by a yearling in one of the paddocks and then the decision was made. “I made my first purchase, a bay filly by Sleeping Indian out of Cadeau Speciale, which I named Yorkshire Pudding, a tribute to my Yorkshire roots. “I was looking for a local trainer and, following a number of enquiries with local yards, I immediately hit it off with Tim Easterby; perhaps both being staunch Yorkshiremen had some bearing on my decision.” After waiting so long to own a horse, Rhodes might have deserved a flying start, but he didn’t get one. He explains: “Yorkshire Pudding went into training but regrettably was troubled by shin problems and other niggles that come with a two-year-old. “The following season she eventually made it to the racetrack, being placed on a number of occasions, but continued to be plagued by niggling injuries which resulted in her being turned out in August to help her recover.” One horse costs plenty, but an owner often feels the need to have their eggs in at least two baskets, and Rhodes admits: “It was then I made the decision to look for another horse, but a colt this time, and I picked up a bay colt by Dandy Man out of Moonline Dancer at the Goresbridge Breeze-Up Sales.
94 THOROUGHBRED OWNER BREEDER INC PACEMAKER
Oct_170_ROAForum.indd 94
21/09/2018 14:49