OFF THE RECORD #76

Hold Your Horses!
The Good, The Bad and The Absurdly Equine

Let’s be honest — 2025 has been a rocky ride so far. The world feels like it’s been thrown in a tumble dryer, your banker in Race 5 finished somewhere near the town mall, and every second headline truly is fake news. If you’ve found yourself sighing more than smiling lately, you’re not alone.

To bring a bit of relief from the madness, we’ve compiled a few unusual stories from the weird and wonderful world of horses and horseracing. They’re the kind of stories that remind us that horses have been revered for centuries, and that the sport of kings isn’t just about odds and betting coups. It’s full of characters, chaos, and the occasional laugh-out-loud moment. Think of it as a little mid-year tonic with no side effects, except maybe a smile.

Above: Artist’s image of Emperor Caligula and his horse, Incitatus

To start, we trot all the way back to the Roman Empire, sometime between 37 and 41 AD. The ruler at the time was Caligula, a man widely regarded as a stark-raving lunatic. But if he had one redeeming quality, it was his love of horses. Chief among them was Incitatus, a prized racehorse who lived in royal luxury, was stabled at the palace and treated like nobility.

Caligula’s affection for Incitatus went well beyond the usual brush and carrot. He reportedly rode him to royal banquets, gave him a place at the Emperor’s table, and fed him oats sprinkled with gold flakes. Not stopping there, Caligula planned to appoint Incitatus to the Roman Senate. He even intended to make him the figurehead of his very own cult.

Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your view of equine politics), Caligula was assassinated by members of his inner circle before the Senate got its first four-legged member.

Above: Carvings on Whitehorse Hill (cdn.britannica.com)

Next, we gallop back about 3,000 years, to something straight out of the History Channel’s documentary series, ‘Ancient Aliens’. On the upper slopes of Whitehorse Hill in Oxfordshire, England, you'll find enormous chalk carvings of horses—some stretching hundreds of feet long—cut into the earth and filled with gleaming white chalk. The most famous of these is the Uffington White Horse, believed to have been created sometime between 1380 and 550 BC, during the late Bronze Age or early Iron Age.

These striking figures require constant upkeep. A few times a year, volunteers with the UK’s National Trust scrape back the invading grass and refresh the chalk to keep the horses visible. What’s truly fascinating, though, is that these carvings are best appreciated from above—yet when they were made, there was no such thing as an aerial view. Well... not officially, anyway.

We shake the reins and head into the 20th century, where horse racing had taken off in Ghana. Brought in by British colonial officials, it quickly became a hit. Everyone from the country’s elite to ordinary punters got hooked on the thrill and the betting.

In Accra, the capital, a racecourse was built with one big problem: a nasty bend that had already claimed the lives of at least 11 jockeys. No one could say for sure if it was bad track design or not enough proper training, but either way, it was deadly.

Then in 1966, the jockeys had had enough. Before one meeting, they refused to ride unless a traditional cleansing ritual was done to protect them. They asked for a cow to be sacrificed at the bend to ward off bad spirits. The officials said no. The jockeys went on strike. And the public backed them. In the end, the sacrifice went ahead. It is not known whether any further incidents occurred after the cleansing.

***

Above: Have a Deal (Kiev), with trainer Neels van Baalen (TBA Museum/Natalie Bergh)

Now we turn our reins homeward, to the Vaal Racecourse on a fine spring afternoon, 29 September 1987. This was back in the days before microchips and digital passports ensured horses were who they were supposed to be.

Two part-time trainers, WF ‘Barney’ Barnard and CJ ‘Neels’ van Baalen, cooked up what they believed was a flawless plan to trick the system, and may have landed a tidy sum while they were at it. They had two horses: Barney’s Kiev, a seasoned campaigner with seven wins to his name, and Neels’ much less talented lookalike Have A Deal, who’d only won once and hadn’t finished closer than 12 lengths in his last four.

The plan? Enter Have A Deal in a modest Novice Plate over 1000m… and send Kiev to run in his place. While the real Have A Deal stayed cozy in his Benoni stable, Kiev was loaded into a float, delivered to the course, and saddled up under the unsuspecting eyes of the public and officials.

It had rained in the lead-up to the meeting, so punters were already bracing for a few upsets. In the betting ring, whispers started. Have A Deal, the hopeless longshot, was backed from 25-1 into 20-1. This was not unheard of, maybe someone fancied his chances on soft going. But then things went a bit nuts. After the canter down, his odds tumbled: 14-1… 10-1… then 6-1. Bookies started ‘taking back’ to cover their exposure. Just before the off, Have A Deal was backed into 4-1 and lined up as one of the favourites.

The gates crashed open. There was a bit of bumping early on, but ‘Have A Deal’—in reality, the classy Kiev—jumped like a dream, led for most of the race, and won easing down under Gordon Sterley.

Job done. Horse loaded and returned to his home stable. Neels stuck around for a celebratory lager. It was said that, after his third or fourth beer, he started bragging a bit and revealed the scam to a fellow-drinker. Barney was not in attendance to keep his friend in check.

But the very next day, the jig was up. Someone—maybe a jealous rival, maybe a guilt-ridden punter—dropped a dime on the duo. The Jockey Club’s investigator, Captain Dirk Blignaut, got a tip-off: the horse who won, wasn’t Have A Deal. It was Kiev.

An inquiry began on 19 October 1987. There were lawyers, advocates, video footage, and photos taken by both the course photographer and Blignaut himself. The defence threw everything at it, including a claim that it was all a witch hunt by conservative Afrikaners who didn’t like a school headmaster (Van Baalen) dabbling in racing and gambling. They even argued that the photos were misleading because of ‘lighting and angles’.

But the evidence was solid. The Jockey Club found both trainers guilty of running a ringer, and imposed a permanent ‘warning off’ (banning) from the sport. Barney took it on the chin. Neels tried to appeal, but failed.

In May 1988, both men were also convicted of fraud in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court. They were handed fines to go with their infamy. Barney left South Africa for the United States where he became involved in the lucrative (and legal) cockfighting industry.

Neels resumed duties at Jan Van Riebeeck School in the village of Sundra, near Benoni. According to the school’s website, he was replaced by a new Headmaster in 1991. His whereabouts since are unknown.

***

In the UK, there was a ‘ringer’ scandal in 1844 in the historic Epsom Derby, one of the world’s most prestigious races. Trainer Abraham Levi won the race with a horse purported to be the three-year-old colt, Running Rein. But post-race investigations showed that Levi had sent a five-year-old imposter named Maccabeus to the track. The race was awarded to the original runner up, Orlando, and the solicitor-general later described Levi’s actions as a ‘gross and scandalous fraud’.

Above: Man vs Horse Marathon. (athleticsweekly.com)

One race that’s proved nearly impossible to rig is the madcap Whole Earth Man versus Horse Marathon, held every June in the hilly Welsh town of Llanwrtyd Wells.

It all began in 1980 when a local pub owner, perhaps after a few too many pints, suggested that a human could outrun a horse over long distances—especially if the course was tough enough. The idea stuck, and a new race was born to draw tourists to a town already famous for its offbeat events, like the Bogsnorkeling Championships and the Welsh Open Stone Skimming Championship.

The course is brutal: 35 kilometres of steep, uneven terrain through the Welsh countryside. And for a long time, it was all horse. For 25 years, the four-legged competitors dominated, until a man named Huw Lobb finally crossed the line first in 2004. Since then, just three others have managed the feat: Florien Holtinger in 2007, Ricky Lightfoot in 2022, and Daniel Connolly in 2023.

To wrap things up, here’s a final idea for our racing operators to chew on. How about an “Extreme Day at the Races”?

Back in the early 2000s, extreme sports were all the rage. ESPN’s X Games were pulling huge TV numbers, and crowds were flocking to watch daredevils flip and fly on skateboards, snowboards, and mountain bikes. Sensing an opportunity, Calder Racecourse in Miami, Florida, decided to tap into the trend. In July 2006, they rolled out their first 'Extreme Day’. It was a wild mix of long races, short sprints, backward races, foot races, a race for grey horses, and even events run simultaneously in opposite directions.

Their headline act? The ‘World’s Fastest Daily Double.’ Two races, both off at the same scheduled time: one over 1600m on turf, the other a 1200m dash on dirt. Madness? Maybe. Entertaining? Absolutely. The race caller, Bobby Neuman, had to call the two races at the same time. He made a mess of it, but that was part of the fun. 

Calder sadly shut its doors in 2020, but the spirit behind that day lives on — a reminder that racing can still surprise us. With the right blend of imagination and timing, who’s to say it can’t thrill a whole new generation too?

Sources:
eclipsemagazine.co.uk
horsesport.com
Oddee.com
visitwales.com