The joy of show jumping

There’s a hush in the crowd
As the hooter blares loud
And the round resolutely commences.
And the rider and horse
Wend their way round the course
Trying not to knock poles down off fences.
And they clear the first three
With a joyful esprit
And ne’er an oul’ pole has been clattered.
Then a clunk and “Four faults!”
As a plywood brick bolts
And you know that their hopes have been shattered.

There’s an audible groan
But at home, on my own,
‘Going apeshit’ is putting it mildly.
And the more they knock down,
The more I go to town,
As I jump in the air, yelling wildly
For there’s no fun, I fear,
When the jumper goes clear –
Far better when Dobbin refuses!
When the rider’s thrown straight
In on top of a gate,
Now that’s when show jumping amuses.

Great skill round the course
On an elegant horse
Might well set the nerve-ends a-jangle,
But its better by far
When a hoof strikes the bar
And the two of them get in a tangle.
When the Queen’s only daughter
Fell into the water
Years ago at the Badminton trials,
Oh the laughter was long,
People burst into song –
‘Twas the best sporting moment by miles.

The Demise of the Winter Olympics

The Winter Olympics are here once more,
Though not as good as heretofore.
There’s not the same excitement here
That I enjoyed in yesteryear.
For, though I still admire the skill,
The ski-ing’s really gone downhill.

The Cheltenham Gold Cup

Oh, God bless Mick O’Leary,
His horse first past the post.
He answered every query
And never once did boast.
The Ride of the Valkyrie
Had everyone engrossed,
The aftermath was eerie,
As though we’d seen a ghost.
The weather may be dreary,
With cloud from coast to coast,
But God bless Mick O’Leary-
He needs it more than most.

(P.S.

And bless his horse, so keenly paced
That bore its passenger with haste,
That ran the race with strength and guile,
A mirror of its owner’s style.
Ensured he didn’t get there late,
And did not carry extra weight.)

The Aintree Grand National

Folk get irrational
About the Grand National,
It makes the whole country go crazy.
We’ll urge on a horse
On that Liverpool course
Or berate him for being so lazy.
O’er Beechers they’ll crash
With a cut and a dash
And we’ll stand and we’ll scream at the blighters.
But why do I always
Pick three-leggéd donkeys
That have an old twinge of arthritis?

The hat comes around
And I feel duty bound
To pick out a horse’s name from it.
And when its inspected,
I find I’ve selected
A nag that’s called “Luminous Vomit.”
The boss picks a flyer,
A good, honest trier,
Oh why do the gods have to slight us?
And why do I always
Pick three-leggéd donkeys
That have an old twinge of arthritis?

The starting line’s raised,
And great trails are blazed,
With most of them set for a fall.
The air’s tight with tension,
But never a mention
Of “Luminous Vomit” at all.
The names are related,
I wait with breath bated,
I’m hopping around like St. Vitus.
Oh why do I always
Pick three-leggéd donkeys
That have an old twinge of arthritis?

The enclosure is filled
And the owner is thrilled,
And the bookies all smile with great cunning.
But there’s only one snag –
I can’t find my nag,
Is it fallen? Refused? Or still running?
How I long, how I long
That my horse will run strong!
Just once may it spur and delight us!
But why do I always
Pick three-leggéd donkeys
That have an old twinge of arthritis?

Ballad of a Gambling Man

It started as the odd little flutter,
With some change I kept inside my hat,
And every so often, I’d put a
Few shillings on this horse or that.
My wife was dead set against gambling,
The thoughts of it made her quite ill,
But on Saturday morn, I’d go rambling
To see my old mate, Willie Hill.

All ye, who are travelling to Cheltenham,
Pay heed to my caution’ry tale,
For once I had land
And a bank balance grand,
But I had no perception of scale.

The stakes soon began to get bigger,
I was betting the bulk of my pay.
With ev’ry damned wager, I’d figure
A big win would see me okay.
My wife, she was getting suspicious
For my pay packet seemed pretty thin,
But the stories I told, quite fictitious,
Meant she gullibly took it all in.

So you, waging fortunes at Cheltenham,
Though you think it is par for the course,
Just imagine the hurt,
I lost more than my shirt,
On the back of an old piebald horse.

No longer were days long and sunny,
Oh the bookies are true friends to none!
I was great when I’d plenty of money,
But they blanked me when I was undone.
For Joey and Willy and Paddy
May seem very pleasant and nice,
So long as you remember, dear laddie,
That their friendship will come at a price.

So you, riding gung-ho at Cheltenham,
Hoping hard for that one perfect strike,
Remember Sod’s Law –
Sure, you never once saw
A bookie out riding a bike.

At the Curragh, I met a sharp dealer,
And I laid out the deeds of my house.
Then, after another Tequila,
I said that I’d throw in my spouse.
I looked at the going minutely,
And studied the formbook with cunning,
Then plumped for a horse resolutely –
As far as I know, it’s still running.

Oh you, spending thousands at Cheltenham,
Just hear out this impassioned plea.
Please don’t overspend
Or else you might end
A wandering minstrel like me.

My wife took the news quite serenely
As I packed up my suitcase and left.
Her new man moved in very keenly,
And I stood outside, quite bereft.
I’m sleeping among the hydrangeas,
Hoping someone will throw me a crumb,
And I’m begging for pennies from strangers,
Still hoping the big one will come.

So you, on the slow boat to Cheltenham,
In your quest for some zest in your life,
Please don’t be a booby,
Forget about Ruby,
And spend it instead on your wife.

Will Jessica Kurtin Ever Pull Herself Together?

I’ve never been partial to watching fine horses
Jump stupid-shaped fences on stupid-shaped courses.
I’m left rather cold by a faultless clear round,
And give a loud cheer when a bar goes to ground.
But best of them all is the horse that refuses!
Oh, how the recalcitrant gee-gee amuses
When the rider’s sent sprawling, demolishing railings,
And the crowd roars approval on viewing his failings.

But recently there has been talk of skulduggery,
Drugging and doping, and chemical thuggery.
Accusations abound as to who might administer
Illegal biotics, and other things sinister.
The riders all claim that they have no idea
Why the tests on the horses don’t come back all clear,
And the trainers and vets are all equally puzzled
As to how all these dodgy narcotics are guzzled.

There’s just one solution – it must be the horses
Who buy all these drugs from their undisclosed sources.
Last week at the Horse Show, you could see a few jumping
With quivering fetlocks and adrenaline pumping.
And it’s rumoured that one unidentified nag
Was caught in his stable with a brown paper bag.
The world must be warned for there is no mistaking
The problems inherent in equine drug-taking.

They say you can lead any horse off to water,
But not if he is a confirmed cocaine snorter.
And would the police trust their own horses if
They were found to be smoking a massive great spliff?
Yes, where would we be if the horses and dunkies
Went stealing in Tesco’s like desperate junkies?
And why aren’t the Drug Squad in Dublin out stopping
The show-jumping stallions who practise pill-popping?

Oh, narcotics and horses, they never should mix –
There’s much better ways to be getting their kicks.
The world laughed out loud at the ludicrous tale
Of the American stallion that didn’t inhale.
But we mustn’t be harsh, and we mustn’t forget
The way that these horses get saddled with debt.
For everyone knows, once addiction has started,
A foal and his money are very soon parted.

Tour de France

Once again, the Tour de France
Is won by Mr. Armstrong, Lance,
Who captured all the famous scalps
On his traversal of the Alps,
And well deserves that yellow top,
As cream of this year’s cycling crop.
For seven years his swaying bum
Has brought him to the podium,
And all the rest, though fast and fit,
Are surely sick of watching it.

And, as the Champs Elysées cheers,
Our minds fly backwards several years,
To that great day when Stephen Roche
Made his Parisien approach.
When Ireland watched him cycle in,
As though out on a Sunday spin,
Afraid that this most friendly chap
Would blow it on the final lap,
And let go of the handlebar,
Or be run over by a car.
Oh how it gave our hearts a lift
To see him not arrive adrift.

And yet, the memory that really
Stands out isn’t Stephen’s wheelie,
But rather at the presentation,
When the leader of our nation
Tried to steal the rightful thunder
From our Irish cycling wonder.
As Charlie waved his arms aloft
(And here in Ireland thousands scoffed)
Millions, staring at his face,
Thought Mr. Haughey won the race,
And from Bangkok to Yucatan,
They wondered how so old a man
Could triumph on so long a trek
With such a hard and wrinkled neck.

But I, whose energy is spent,
While cycling up a slight ascent,
And must dismount to take a pill
When halfway up a little hill,
I must salute those gallant men,
Who sprint up hills and down agen.

But one quite nagging thought persists
About these sporting masochists –
They pump those legs up mountainsides,
Ten thousand feet and more besides,
In hot and very humid weather,
Backsides made of hardened leather,
Pedals strapped onto their feet,
Sweating madly in the heat,
Muscles straining, brows perspiring,
Gulping air and slowly tiring,
Resisting every urge to throttle
The wag who hands an empty bottle,
Panting as the climb gets higher,
Praying they don’t burst a tyre.
A thousand miles and more they do it –
Why on earth do they go through it?
Why do they persist in straining,
Yard by yard without complaining?
The only reason I can see,
That they’d endure the misery
Of heat and strain and hurt and bugs,
Is if they all were high on drugs.