Imagine this - early morning, about 5.30. A mist rolls in from the river making everything chilled and for those of us just coming home a little cold in our finery. In the centre of the maidan, the Victoria Memorial stands to the right of the racecourse: the reason for all of us being there so early. This was in my jockey days and I was often coming from a sleepless night of passion to watch the latest inamorata ride out as the horses came to the track for their early morning workouts and gallops.
I would sit , yawning and sated, lazily looking around me as the obsessed fiddled, cursing with binoculars as they peered through the mist to see who was working well, how much the jockey had kept in hand on his gallop, My mother would rarely have her horses do more than an eight anna gallop - she felt the horse left the race behind him on the track and needed to be fit for Saturday,
Recaffinanted I would go home and bathe and then set out to meet the others - on a Wednesday the handicaps came out and we would go to Flurys, drink hot chocolate and plot and plan the betting that would take place over the weekend. If it was Tolly race time my parents would inevitably fall into a row where my mother would accuse my father of not having a clue how to handicap and him telling her she had no idea how to run one. They really didn't speak to each other again until Friday.
If it was RCTC time I was in love with my jockey, who was married with a wife in England, far enough away to make it seem OK. Of course it wasn't but he was special and I loved him so a few months for two years were better than nothing at all.
From the small baba who had believed that racing was about the exit form the starting gate I had arrived as a seasoned race goer. I bet and sometimes won. My best ever bet was on a horse called Aya Toofan, which roughly translates to Here Comes the Storm. It was monsoon and the sky was black - I had a hundred rupees left and I put it all to win on the horse. Everyone in our box and the box next door laughed at me.
The race started as the storm started, black clouds emptying their rain like sheets of bullets, thunder rolling around the track and forked lightening finding its way into ground all around us. A great cheer went up form the crowd - "Aya Toofan!"- as he splashed past the winning post some two lengths clear of everything else in the race. The price - 50/1. Not bad for no sentiment in racing.
There was a party that night as we danced the night away until the wee small hours and then rubbing our eyes headed back to the track.
I would sit , yawning and sated, lazily looking around me as the obsessed fiddled, cursing with binoculars as they peered through the mist to see who was working well, how much the jockey had kept in hand on his gallop, My mother would rarely have her horses do more than an eight anna gallop - she felt the horse left the race behind him on the track and needed to be fit for Saturday,
Recaffinanted I would go home and bathe and then set out to meet the others - on a Wednesday the handicaps came out and we would go to Flurys, drink hot chocolate and plot and plan the betting that would take place over the weekend. If it was Tolly race time my parents would inevitably fall into a row where my mother would accuse my father of not having a clue how to handicap and him telling her she had no idea how to run one. They really didn't speak to each other again until Friday.
If it was RCTC time I was in love with my jockey, who was married with a wife in England, far enough away to make it seem OK. Of course it wasn't but he was special and I loved him so a few months for two years were better than nothing at all.
From the small baba who had believed that racing was about the exit form the starting gate I had arrived as a seasoned race goer. I bet and sometimes won. My best ever bet was on a horse called Aya Toofan, which roughly translates to Here Comes the Storm. It was monsoon and the sky was black - I had a hundred rupees left and I put it all to win on the horse. Everyone in our box and the box next door laughed at me.
The race started as the storm started, black clouds emptying their rain like sheets of bullets, thunder rolling around the track and forked lightening finding its way into ground all around us. A great cheer went up form the crowd - "Aya Toofan!"- as he splashed past the winning post some two lengths clear of everything else in the race. The price - 50/1. Not bad for no sentiment in racing.
There was a party that night as we danced the night away until the wee small hours and then rubbing our eyes headed back to the track.
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