Category: News

A Very Busy October! October is very much an all set sail month. The horses’ fitness work has all stepped up with the majority having had a good couple pieces of work. With the rain over the last few weeks, it has allowed us to get back onto the grass and keep the work very varied. The first bunch have been away for a racecourse gallop and Kayley and Josh have started plotting engagements for the ones that will be ready to run early doors.   All the horses have enjoyed a school on grass and we are really impressed with how our 3 year old store purchases have taken to jumping. They have been out on the grass on a couple of occasions with them all showing a great attitude and willingness towards their work which is so pleasing at this early stage. They will continue to do plenty of jumping and we can look forward to Yogi Breisner coming in next month to do some schooling with them at Chard Equestrian. We took 7 to Larkhill at the end of last week to have a good blow. This seemed very beneficial and we will try and get as many out as possible for an away day before they run.    On Saturday, we welcomed Blackmore Racing Club into the yard to see Ted The Thief. He is another candidate that we hope to get out early in the season. We have a wonderful group of members who have joined the club and we hope we can supply them with another enjoyable season. Soup, sausage rolls and cake were provided from our great support team and I think everyone enjoyed their morning.    The very last handful of horses have come into work which leaves us with a huge team to represent both Kayley and Josh’s yards this season. We have some really lovely prospects and several to get very excited about. We will have our first “winter” National Hunt runner hopefully this week and have a couple aiming for Dunsmore for the first weekend of the Point to Point season.   On the 7th November, Jane Reed, who has spent the last few months riding out for us, is taking part in the British Horse Society Charity Flat Race at Newbury. She will be partnering Our Dylan who she enjoyed a racecourse gallop on at Larkhill. The link for Jane’s Just Giving Page is below:   https://www.justgiving.com/page/jane-reed-1713889073516 Main Photo: Work days at Blackmore Farm Middle Photo: Ted The Thief looking a picture for his members Bottom Photo: Josh and Cue Jump

Six Weeks To Go With the majority of the horses now back in work, it has been a busy month with plenty of road work followed by a lot of slow and steady cantering to build up the horses fitness. Most of the horses have had their first jump of the season including the babies, who all look a really exciting bunch.    As the horses’ work increases, it is a good way to build up a fitness profile of each individual using our Arioneo Equimetres. We can evaluate who is working hard and having a good blow or who is finding their work easy and therefore their work can increase. The Equimetres were a huge asset to us last year and something that we found, as a team, very interesting to use and read the data coming from each horse.   Knightwick and Dunsmore kick off the Point to Point season on the 9th & 10th November. We will aim to have runners at both meetings but it will be very much weather and ground dependent. After the amazing 2023/24 season, it will be extremely hard to top it, but all we can hope for is happy and healthy horses. We will have our biggest number of horses to run this season, which is very exciting. We have expanded our team of staff to allow for this and we hope the weather is a little kinder to us this winter.   We are very excited to say that Jane Reed, who has spent the last few months riding out for us, is taking part in the British Horse Society Charity Flat Race at Newbury on the 7th November. We are hoping that Our Dylan will be her mount for the day and will give her a wonderful ride while raising money for the BHS. Our Dylan’s owners are also a charity based group, so it seems very fitting that Dylan can take part in the race. The link for Jane’s Just Giving Page is below:   https://www.justgiving.com/page/jane-reed-1713889073516   Picture: Cue Jump looking amazing in the sun!

Open Day Success! On Sunday 1st, we held our annual Open Day, where we invited owners, friends, family and anyone in between that has helped us throughout the season. It was lovely to see everyone and it was a great way to have a sociable catch up before the start of the new season. We had over 160 people here who enjoyed a parade of horses followed by lunch. Unfortunately, the weather did not play ball after it looked set to be a glorious day, but in typical English fashion, it rained – a lot!!   We paraded 31 horses who all looked incredible. Huge credit to the staff for having them looking immaculate. Most of them behaved bar Stellar Stream, who could not quite hold his excitement in and put on a lovely show for everyone watching. Lunch soon followed, along with the rain. With the help of The Sausage Shed and several members of the team, we had a lovely Ham and Lamb salad followed by plenty of cake.   Following lunch, we played a game of Heads and Tails with racing related questions, whether they were about Blackmore Farm or racing in general. Nina Hayton was the successful winner who won a membership to Blackmore Point to Point Racing Club. We raised £455 through donations and we have donated proceedings to Alice Procter’s Go Fund Me.   Alice was a brilliant member for our team a few years ago and unfortunately had a bad race fall at Cartmel back in July. She underwent surgery to stabilise a thoracic spinal fracture which was successful. Her recovery and rehab will take a while but we wish her all the best.    Into September and the horses’ work has all increased. We will spend the next month cantering away and introducing some jumping and before we know it, winter will be here!   Alice Procter’s Go Fund Me Link: https://www.gofundme.com/f/alice-procter

Time To Get Started Again! Another month has flown by and September is creeping around quickly. The majority of the horses are back in work now with the last handful still out to grass enjoying the final few weeks of summer. It has definitely not been the greatest of summers weather wise, but all the horses look in great shape considering. Some have grown upwards and quite a few have grown outwards!!   All the staff are back at Blackmore Farm after their holidays. We have a few new members who have joined the team. Oli Watson has joined us from Sarah Humphrey’s. He rode out the quirky Nickle Back every day, so he will be a brilliant asset to the team. Purdy Peaster and Tilly Garton both have joined us from Joe Tizzard’s. Purdy has ridden successfully Pointing on her own horses while Tilly’s family have purchased the lovely Tip Top Mountain to teach her the ropes. Oli’s mum, Michelle, also joins us on the yard. She is another great character to have around and will very much be the “Mummy” of the yard.    We also have several new faces on the yard in horse form. Most were purchased throughout the summer, whether it be 3yo stores, horses in training from the sales or a few from other trainers. It is always an exciting time of year as we learn about their characters and abilities. It will be our biggest number of horses in training to date so fingers crossed we have another successful year! The 2023/24 season was incredible and it will be extremely hard to top, but we will give it our best shot.   We are launching the second season of Blackmore Racing Club with new recruit, Ted The Thief, joining the club. He is a very exciting maiden horse who ran 3 times in Ireland in 5 weeks. He is still only 4 years old and has benefitted from a holiday. Please get in touch if you would like to join. Last season, we had 5 winners and 3 placings from 12 runners. Every horse that ran for the club was cheered into the winners enclosure at decent tracks such as Larkhill and Cothelstone. The club joining fee is £395 (no extra or hidden fees). There is no price increase from last season when we had plenty of fun.    Lalor had a very successful trip to Aintree for the ROR Dressage Championship with Steph, where they won the Intro Restricted Championship Class. Enormouse also won the ROR National Dressage Horse Novice Restricted Championship Class with Sophie Hawke. It was brilliant to bring home two winners to Blackmore Farm, be it in a different discipline.   We have been embracing the Olympic spirit and had our own Blackmore Farm Olympics with new scull hats that we had kindly been given by Charles Owen. It was a 15 meter sprint, unbox your hat, get your hat on and put your hat silk on! It was a tie break between Josh and Lauren. The whole team  are very grateful to Charles Owen for keeping us safe!   As most of you are aware, Josh and Kayley went to Guernsey during the summer, where they got married. Their day didn’t go without its problems with the weather challenging them, but the photos look beautiful and sounds like it was a lovely day.

Summer Holidays! The Point to Point season drew to a close and one by one, the horses started going out on their holidays. We had a handful of National Hunt summer runners that have stayed in work and 5 Stores that were purchased across the Store Sales that have been broken in and continued their education for a few weeks before enjoying a break. After the excitement of the National Championship, we still had Holiday Fund to run at Bratton Down the following weekend. He stormed home from the back of the last and galloped on strongly up the long Bratton Down run-in to win by ½ length. It was a shame that the Championship had finished the week before but it was also nice to finish our season with a win for the Blackmore Racing Club, who have had a perfect first season with five winners. We all as a team headed to Umberleigh to enjoy a rare opportunity to go Pointing with no horses. We all had a lovely picnic and had a lovely afternoon in the sun catching up with friends and plenty of our lovely owners. Everyone headed to Hatherley Manor for the National Point to Point Awards at the end of June which was thoroughly enjoyable. The National Hunt horses have been running well. Moon Lady ran a fab race at Bangor, just getting touched off by ½ length. Unfortunately she did not enjoy the hustle and bustle in Handicap company on her next run and ran disappointingly. We will look to campaign her back in a Novice or Maiden next time out. Ghost Jury, a new recruit for us, has run well on both her starts for us. Albeit being keen and needing to learn to settle, there is ability there and she has now joined the 4racing Owners Club to run alongside Our Dylan who has enjoyed a small mid summer break before an autumn campaign.  Kayley and Lauren have been busy with the Sales over the summer. They came home with two Stores from Tattersalls May Store Sale, a gelding by Jet Away and a filly by Dragon Dancer. This sale has been very successful for Blackmore Farm with the likes of Tigga Time, Big Bert and Mount Mason being purchased there. A trip to the Goffs IRE Arkle Sale saw a lovely son of Idaho come home and looks to be a nice forward sort. We purchased two Horses In Training at  Doncaster Goffs UK Summer Sale. Nelson Criq and Lemoine who are both off the National Hunt track having ran some decent races. They both will make the switch to Point to Points and look ideal Maiden prospects. They had a less successful trip back to Tattersalls for their July Sale coming home empty handed.  Steph and Lalor have been taking the dressage scene by storm. He has taken to it like a duck to water and he is a true credit to Steph. They have won the majority of their outings and nothing seems to phase him. He looks a picture in his tests and they have qualified to go to the ROR National Championships at Aintree on the 22nd August. Lalor will go with ex inmate Enormouse, who has also qualified with Sophie Hawke. The staff have all been enjoying some time off and the yard has been pressure washed, creosoted and painted ready for the horses to start coming in, which the first bunch have already. The next few months will consist of plenty of road work and getting everything prepared for our Owners Day in September.