Harwood recalls Brave story

While his sole interest may now be focused on selling high-performance motor cars, the story 30 years ago was an altogether contrasting picture for Guy Harwood as horsepower of a very different kind was the centre of his attention.

Although the former Pulborough-based trainer can reflect with great pride on a career in racing that yielded many high-profile wins, it is the year of 1986 that he will best be remembered for thanks to the mighty Dancing Brave.

And he is able to fondly recall a story that was nearly not his to tell.

He said: “Jeremy Tree always had the pick of Prince Khalid Abdullah’s horses at that time. Fortunately for me he had two or three Lyphard horses that hadn’t really gone on, so Dancing Brave wasn’t really on his list. He was very much on my list.

“Jeremy didn’t like Lyphard’s. You had to be quite gentle with them. They are very highly-bred racehorses. They didn’t want much training. Jeremy was pretty hard on his horses and I think he blew them out and they couldn’t take that. It was my benefit.”

As is often the case with the very best horses, the signs are usually pretty conclusive early on that what they achieve on the track will be special. Dancing Brave was no different.

Harwood remembered: “James Delahooke bought him in America, when he came back to me he was a late May foal and he went down to the bottom yard with the backward yearlings.

“One day in July I was watching the third lot from the bottom yard and said to my lad Chris Read, ‘what’s that horse Chris?’, he said ‘that’s Dancing Brave’, and I …

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