It was around this time last year that I began to develop pangs of regret that I no longer frequent the racing world that provided me with a decent living and a fairly colourful lifestyle for more than two decades. Well, the pangs are back again as all the big trial races for the superb Cheltenham Festival (March 15-18) are being run at present and, probably due to the paucity of racing here in Israel, I feel very much on the sidelines. 

Last year I failed miserably to provide my regular readers (yes, there are one or two brave souls still out there) with a winner to help pay the Chanukah/Christmas credit card bills, so I have gone to even greater lengths than normal to hopefully provide you with not one, but two ‘sure things’, both of which have an Israeli/Jewish connection.

Let’s start with the Cheltenham Gold Cup, truly a breathtaking sporting spectacle. A race dominated in recent seasons by champion trainer Paul Nicholls with the mighty pair of Kauto Star and Denman, until last year when a horse called Imperial Commander, trained by the well hyphenated Nigel Twiston-Davies, beat the pair of them. Where would the world of horse racing be without its hyphens? There was a time when I used to wonder whether a hyphenated addition to my name might advance me into more exalted racing circles. How does Paul Collingham-Alster sound (Collingham being my last abode in the UK before I defected)? Or how about Paul Alster-Verbolofsky, adding my paternal grandmother’s maiden name? Would either of those monikers have got me any closer to a Jockey Club membership? Somehow, I very much doubt it.

But here are not one, but two Jewish hyphenated names that might just top ‘em all on Cheltenham Gold Cup Day. Racehorse owner/breeder Robert Waley-Cohen and his son Sam have already produced one big surprise when their horse Long Run beat Kauto Star to win the King George VI Chase at Kempton Park last week. Sam Waley-Cohen (28) owns a chain of upmarket dental practices. What makes him pretty exceptional is that he is an amateur rider and not a professional, competing (thanks to his father’s horses), at the highest level of the sport. He might not ride quite as well as champion jockey and 'BBC Sports Personality of the Year' Tony McCoy, or the elegant Irishman Ruby Walsh, but he is a very competent rider who has enjoyed tremendous success at previous Cheltenham Festivals and at Aintree, where he twice won over those awesome fences on his dad’s Katarino.

The Waley-Cohen’s are a high society family who are very active in raising funds for cancer research, particularly so following the death from cancer of Sam’s younger brother Thomas, who sadly died in 2004 at the age of just 20. The family is always coming up with innovative ways to raise funds and famously held the much-publicized 'toffs' roller-disco at which the now future Queen of England, Kate Middleton, (a close friend of the family), came along wearing hot pants (see home page photo) and caused something of a paparazzi sensation!

Robert Waley-Cohen’s grandfather was a senior figure in the British Shell oil company, a friend of Winston Churchill, and chairman of London’s United Synagogue. The present day Robert is the boss of the Alliance Medical organisation and, as we have noted, is a very successful owner and breeder of jumps racehorses. I met him on a couple of occasions, and had the pleasure of speaking with him moments after a horse of his called The Dragon Master had won at Sandown at odds of 100/1. He seemed a very likeable guy and very down to earth. (Then again, who wouldn't be in top form after bagging a 100/1 winner!)

Robert’s latest star Long Run is a top class horse who, having won at Kempton, is now second-favourite to win the Gold Cup. It would be amazing for a horse ridden by a Jewish amateur jockey to win the most coveted prize in such a professional sport (even more so than the Grand National), but I think Sam Waley-Cohen has a tremendous chance. His current odds of 7/1 may well be much shorter on the day, so if you like a wager, I’d say ‘get on now’.

The second leg of our Jewish horsey double actually runs on the opening day of the Cheltenham Festival (Long Run goes on the fourth and last day), and is a leading candidate for the Champion Hurdle. Menorah, named after the seven branched candelabrum that was lit daily in the Temple in Jerusalem more than two millennia ago and was adopted in 1948 as the symbol of the modern State of Israel, is also a very talented racehorse trained by Philip Hobbs at Minehead, in Somerset. I believe that the six-year-old gelding has a seriously good chance of winning the hurdles crown on March 15. (Mind you, I thought that of Punjabi last year and he's still running!)

I’m not quite sure how owner Diana Whateley came to give Menorah his name or what, if any, her connection is to Israel. I really believe though that she has a very good chance of picking up the winners’ trophy in a couple of months time with her fast improving horse. He has already proved how much he loves racing at the unique Cheltenham track, last year winning the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle under a great ride from the excellent Richard Johnson. 

Menorah won two big trial races for the Champion Hurdle earlier this season (both at Cheltenham) and still looks to be getting better and better. He is a 5/1 chance to kick off my double at the meeting which, put in simple terms, means that if you were to bet £1 on Menorah and Long Run winning, (and they both do the business), you would receive a very handsome return of £48. That’s far better than wasting your hard earned pound on the 14,000,000/1 chance of winning the lottery, and it’s a great deal more fun cheering on your two fancies.

So fingers are crossed (a Christian expression for this pluralistic blog), that Menorah and Long Run, owners Robert Waley-Cohen and Diana Whateley, and jockeys Sam Waley-Cohen and Richard Johnson, can give us all something to cheer whilst I watch on from a corner of the world where the sport is now all but defunct but, from where, thanks to another big racing fan, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, and his Dubai racing channel, (we’re all brothers in sport remember), I very much hope to be able to follow the action as it happens.

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