Meydan Calling: Proper Racing With Ian Williams

"I was born in London, actually, but soon moved to Devon and was brought up in Devon. Right in the middle of the UK's boot.

"A wonderful part of the world, close to the beach, near areas of exciting landscapes, and a good place to grow up."

"I was quite fortunate because my father trained horses in the west country, down in Devon, and although he had a little stable that's where it started, I was always around horses.

"I was very involved from a young age, so I was always around horses, and I ended up working, helping my father ride them, and doing all those things while I was in school."

"I went to college, and I realised that my father worked very, very hard for not a lot back really.

"He had a passion for racing, but I think he lost more money than he ever made." Although he was successful, it was a very hard life. He used to ride the horses, shoe the horses, and drive them to the races—he literally did everything.

"It was seven days a week, and there was rarely any time for anything else, really."

Williams recalls that his father had eight to 12 horses at work at a time within the small stable.

He would begin his studies in business and accounting before realising that a career in training could be the way to go.

"Actually, at the age of 18, I started on a training manager route with a well-known betting group in the UK called William Hill and then ended up running betting shops at the age of probably 18 and a half, and I was doing that for six months."

"It was a little tedious, and they were very dark and dingy places." Although I thought it would be a great way of using both of my skills with the horses and with the numerical stuff,

"It was interesting, and I found myself doing quite well, but I quickly found myself bored to tears."

His first experience with training is one he recalls fondly.

"I actually saw an advertisement in the racing newspaper in the UK, The Sporting Life, in which a trainer named Jenny Pitman advertised for an assistant. I thought it sounded like a great idea, so I applied and got the job.

"I went to Mrs. Pitman’s, who frightened the living daylights out of me. I also had to probably be a little bit liberal with the truth, telling her I was a little bit older than I was.

"Eventually she took me on for a trial, and I had four and a half wonderful years there."

Williams recalls being 19 at the time, but admits he may have had to stretch the truth by claiming to be two years older, but the rest is history, and that is where his training career began.

After the apprenticeship under Mrs. Pitman, he would go on to work with another English trainer, Martin Pipe, another experience that Williams is grateful for.

"He was the National Hunt champion trainer, so that was very much the National Hunt side of things."

"But I was very fortunate to get a job as an assistant to a French trainer called Francois Doumen, who was very successful in his

travels to Japan and Hong Kong and had a very nice string of jumping horses in France, probably the best jumpers that France has ever seen as a group at one time.

"Then I learned a lot about flat racing with him because he had a great string of flat horses as well." "So, I really enjoyed that."

Looking Back at a Glittering Career

Williams has had many great milestones and achievements throughout his career, including winning every race in Great Britain. a feat I had to ask him about.

"It was quite memorable to have trained the winner of every flat and National Hunt race in Britain. That was quite something, because I don't believe anybody else has ever done that, or nobody's ever come up with anybody who's done it, let's put it that way.

"I think one of my first highlights was a horse called Batman Senora that I trained for a French client.

"We took him from England back to France and won the equivalent of the French King George, which is a very valuable steeplechase." That was a fantastic day.

"Also, the first winner we had at the Cheltenham Festival was Ballyalton, which was an exceptional day out as well."

"But we've been fortunate to have a couple of winners at Royal Ascot, so they were fantastic."

"I'd have to say Sir Maximilian winning in Dubai over five furlongs was quite a day on Super Saturday as well.

"So yes, we've had lots of nice things happen so far."

The tagline for his stable is "passion to succeed never dies," and Williams has had some classy types throughout his career in training.

"I think some of the small ones right at the beginning were influential, like Governor Daniel, The Prince, and Auburn Boy.

"They were not the greatest horses, but they won lots of races." They may have been winning small races, but they made a difference because they got you noticed as having the ability to train winners. So that really got us going.

Going Global

"But I think Sir Maximilian helped enormously on the international stage.

"We were also very lucky a few years ago to have a horse called Magic Circle. He was a betting favourite for the Melbourne Cup five years ago. So, he was very helpful, although on the day he didn't run as well as he could have.

"However, those things have really helped on a global scale."

He now prepares the enemy for a trip to Saudi Arabia before he is unleashed in Dubai.

Bought in France, Williams is excited about what is ahead for the 6-year-old gelded son of Muhaarar.

"We bought him from France. A good friend of mine, Rupert Pritchard Gordon, does some business in a bloodstock agency for us in France, and we bought him out of Francis-Henri Graffard's yard.

"We didn't pay huge money for him. I think he was about 90,000 euros, but he'd been a decent horse, and he had a very good pedigree.

"But we thought there might be some improvement to come over time as he matured; he was a 4YO at the time.

"We actually sent him out to Dubai last season, and we got into a little bit of trouble with him because he had only run once, and we were struggling for another race." So we entered him in the two-mile listed event.

"It was more a case of getting him a second run in Dubai as much as anything, and he ran a huge race that day and showed us that he stayed basically, which we wouldn't have been sure about beforehand."

"He then came back to the UK and won a decent handicap, then he ran a great race at Ascot in a listed event and probably should have won over two miles but just didn't get the run of the race."

Williams admits that after those few starts and a taste of success with Enemy, he strayed slightly before returning to his own standard of performance.

"We lost him a little bit after that, and we really didn't know why." We ran him at Glorious Goodwood in the Goodwood Cup, and I thought it'd be a race that would cut up because there were so many good horses in it. I thought they would all shy away from each other, but they didn’t, and it was probably one of the better runnings of the Goodwood Cup. But he didn’t perform as well as he could.

"That day, William Buick rode him and told me, 'Look, Ian, he was keen, but I don't think he really settles.'So we put him away for a while and prepared for the Ebor.

"We thought we were going to the Ebor with a really good chance." David Egan rode him that day, and he never really got going. David came to me and said that a mile and a half was too short for him.

"So, we were in a bit of a quandary where I had two world-class jockeys telling us two different things.

So we went back and looked at the horse, and even though he had never made any noises or done anything unusual, we decided to call our local wind expert Ben and have the horse radio-scoped.

"Ben said there’s nothing wrong with him, and I said there is definitely something wrong with him, so we sent him again, and eventually it was a hey presto moment that found there had been a collapse of his larynx and a few other things going on."

There are numerous options.

The discovery and diagnosis allowed Williams and his team to work on getting Enemy back to the form he was in when they first purchased him.

"At that point, we knew we had a horse that was performing at 100 plus on every run, but he was actually struggling with his breathing." So, we had his wind done, and his first race back was the mile-and-a-half handicap in Dubai in January.

"To be perfectly honest, I thought he probably needed his run because we'd missed his prep race in the UK due to the frost."

The trainer was pleasantly surprised when Enemy won by a length on his return to Meydan.

"He went out and bolted up, and it was a nice surprise over a trip that we thought would be on the short side for him."

After he runs in the Red Sea in Saudi Arabia, he will return to Dubai, where Williams has accepted an invitation for him to run in the Gold Cup.

He has had two runs in Meydan, winning one by a length; before that, he ran fourth in Group Three of the Nad al Sheba Trophy.

Williams says Enemy enjoys racing in the Middle East, and his form does not change much from how he performs at home in the UK.

"One thing that we have noticed as we get to know him better is that he appears to perform better fresh." He had only been in Dubai for 10 days when he ran the handicap and ran very well.

"I think he enjoys the flat and fast surface of the Meydan track.

"He has been based in Dubai this winter, which I think is advantageous when it's only a two-and-a-half-hour flight to Saudi."

"He’s already accustomed to the heat and the time difference, so those are positive things."

"The Sheema Classic" (a nomination they had for him) was just sort of an entry as he had done so well over a mile and a half.

"But that can be a very, very competitive race." So, we are sticking to where we have some chance realistically, as opposed to just running for running's sake.

Many Outlooks

After his campaign in Saudi Arabia and Dubai, the plans for Enemy are currently fluid, as Williams said.

"I think the plan will evolve one way or another."

"Saudi is going to be very interesting because it’s a different territory, and we’re taking a horse there that we know has had a problem, but we are hoping the problem has been solved."

"How he runs there will probably make little difference to what he does in Dubai or no difference at all." So hopefully he's fit and well and he can go and run in the Dubai Gold Cup, and then we'll sort of sit down with the owners and make a plan as to what he does after that.

Williams had also nominated a trio of stablemates to join Enemy in Dubai, but plans have changed, the trainer added.

Interesting Others

Spirit of Light is a 6YO gelded son of Dark Angel who had track experience in the UAE before joining the Williams yard, a story that Williams said was an interesting one.

"Well, it's quite an amusing story. He came to me through his owner, Dubai-based Sayed Hashish. He sent me a horse the year before last called East Asia.

"East Asia was a five-year-old maiden who had run 16 times when he came to me. He turned up in the yard, and he isn’t a very big horse; he is athletic but not overly big with the greatest amount of scope. But I sort of looked at him and thought, "Why on earth has this chap sent this horse to the UK?"

"At that point, I think he was rated 69." At the end of that UK season, he was rated nearly 100, having won four races. He went out to Dubai, ran very well in the listed race, and was then invited to run in the World Cup.

"He'd travelled from Dubai as a less-than-70-rated maiden runner in the UK and then been invited back to Dubai to race, which was quite strange really, but just showed how much he'd improved during the year."He also acquitted himself very well in both races in Dubai.

"So it was the same person who owned Spirit of Light.He was really disappointing in the UK, and we never really got to the bottom of him this season. His two runs back in handicap company back in Dubai have been rather good, and he was probably just a little outclassed last time out.

He had been nominated for the Dubai Turf, Dubai Gold Cup, and the Godolphin Mile, though Williams said he would stick to handicap races before returning home.

"In all honesty, he's probably not good enough to race there and won't be high enough to qualify for any of those races."

"So he'll probably come back to the UK in March, and we'll start planning towards some handicap races here."

East Asia, the horse Williams spoke about, was the older stablemate at 8 years old, although the Iffraaj x Chan Tong gelding has impressed both at home and in Dubai.

Winning impressively at Goodwood and Newbury, he also finished second in a Group 3 race at Meydan last year.

He was nominated for the Group Two Gold Cup this season, but, as the trainer said, he will not be making the trip.

"East Asia was due to go to Dubai in January, and he suffered from a sickness before traveling, and then we were hoping to get him out there in February." It hasn't happened.

"He won't be running in Dubai this winter, so he'll stay here and focus on staying events."

"He’s back in good shape, and it took nearly seven weeks to get him eating, drinking, and looking well again. He'd had quite a nasty shock to his system, but we now understand why.

"It was actually that same shock that stopped him from running for two races in Dubai last year." So we understand that one of the things we do to help horses travel doesn't actually help him; it hinders him.

Green Team is the last of the four who previously had three starts in Meydan. He had also been nominated for the Gold Cup, but, as is the case with East Asia, he will not be joining Enemy in Meydan this season.

"Sadly, he won't be joining the enemy because he's been a little disappointing."

"His first run was good, but in his second run, he just saw far too much daylight and didn't settle." He ran well last time over a trip that was very much short of his best, but off a rating of 90, which he is currently, he wouldn't get into the Gold Cup and would probably be a waste.

"I see him being very effective back in the UK this spring and summer."

A Stable Full Of Stars

Although Enemy is the only horse being prepped for Saudi Arabia and Dubai, the yard currently has 120 horses in work based in the heart of the UK.

"We are based not far from Birmingham Airport, and we have quite a big team of jumpers in at the moment—probably 30 jumpers on the go and 70 flat horses."

"So, the string is around 100, and that can go up and down a little during the year when the two seasons crossover.

With a yard that includes both flat and jump horses, Williams admits that, although it does keep him on his toes, he loves jump racing and having a mix to train.

"I think it keeps me tired and knackered most of the time," the trainer chuckled.

"I love jump racing; it's a wonderful sport, and I love the people."

"But it's a very difficult job to manage as a business." It's tough; it's hard to find good horses, and the returns in jumps racing are relatively small compared to the outlay. whereas it doesn't have the international opportunities that flat racing does.

"We found in our own little way that flat racing with the international opportunities around the world was right for us. We've been fortunate enough to have a couple of runners in the Melbourne Cup, we've been to Dubai, we're going to Saudi Arabia, we've had runners on the ice in San Moritz, and we've travelled all around Europe with horses.

"So we've seen and done lots of things and been a little bit more than participants in them; we’ve been competitive in those race events."

"So, the flat can be a lot more rewarding in a financial and business sense, but National Hunt racing really comes from the heart." "It's proper racing."

Having trained runners around the globe, he has been taking horses to Dubai for many years, and he understands the challenges that arise as international racing’s profile continues to grow.

"Sir Maximilian was our first about 12 years ago.

"I think it's nice to travel with horses, but it's all about having the horses good enough to go." That's why our racing in the UK is becoming increasingly competitive.

"You may have a good horse, but the Australians want to buy it, the Qataris want to buy it, the Saudis want to buy it, and Hong Kong wants to buy it, so it's becoming increasingly difficult to find horses with which we can compete at that level."

"Right now, we are busy, however, and have lots to look forward to. We have a few 2YOs and some nice 3YOs. 

"Hopefully, we'll be able to bring some horses to Meydan next year."