MATTAWAN, who’s grand sire was the great Nijinsky and who’s sire, Nashwan , won the Epsom Derby in 1989 with Willie Carson on board was himself entered for the Derby but never ran. His racing career ended prematurely due to injury. He won his first race, a hot maiden and went on to win a Group Race in Sweden in 1996 with Michael Roberts on board amassing £34000 in prize money in only 6 races. A lot of money in those days. He ran against some of the best horses around at the time including Persion Punch and Innishowen. After 2 years rest and another spell in training it was decided his leg would not stand up to further racing and he was retired. He then spent 2 years doing very little before I heard about him through a friend and contacted Deidre Johnson where he had been in training. She explained to me that he weaves., and windsucks., and field walks., and is very aggressive in the field with other horses, and … ..once I had persuaded her that I understood race horses, agreed to let me have him on loan. At this point I hadn’t even seen him but I was getting the picture.
I went to pick him up from a farm in Ripon. He was lead from the field using a stallion halter and straight into my trailer. He bounced and screamed all the way home. I already had 4 ex race horses at home which we had raced over the years, all stressed out neurotics so I knew Matty was going to fit in straight away, and he did.
That first day I arranged for my neighbour to hang onto Matty while I got on board and off we went up the road. That was it., He moved like a cob, knees up to his chin, tail swishing but he was always going forward even if it was a tad quicker than I would have liked.
Since I was already ’getting on a bit’ I only intended to hack with the odd dressage competition and maybe some clear round jumping. It was in my first lesson with Ian that I realised there was a long way to go. He couldn’t turn left without almost falling, not even in walk., and he stepped all over a very small cross pole. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Ian trying to stifle a laugh, the b…..d !.
Six years down the line and Matty and I are still having fun. He certainly wasn’t bred to dressage, show jump or cross country but that hasn’t stopped us winning. His exuberance in every phase never fails to turn heads and his quality is obvious to all. We are now coasting towards retirement together but not before another couple of BE100’s I hope. I feel very lucky to have him.
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