Barber gearing up for busy season

An outstanding point-to-pointer, a strong back-up team and a squad of unraced youngsters paraded when Chris Barber opened his yard in Herefordshire on Saturday.

Barber (pictured above, fourth from right alongside partner Ella Orttewell), who saddled 40 winners and finished second to Josh Newman in last season’s trainers’ championship for yards with 15 or more horses, said of last season’s Lady Dudley Cup winner Grace A Vous Enki: “I suppose this has to be the star of the show. He was unbeaten last season, but it was definitely the most pressure I have ever felt going to the Lady Dudley Cup. Clive [Hitchings] had always wanted to win that race.”

Grace A Vous Enki has compiled a record of 13 point-to-point wins from 14 starts, all under current men’s champion James King in the colours of Hitchings’ wife Joan. Now rising 11 the gelding won eight of nine while trained by Nicky Sheppard before joining his current yard ahead of last season during which he went on to gain five more victories. He is unbeaten in 11 open races at Larkhill in Wiltshire where he has twice won the Coronation Cup, including when dead-heating with Regatta De Blanc in 2024.

Lady Dudley Cup winner Grace A Vous Enki, with James King helping to lead up (Ce)

King was joined by Ed Doggrell, who rides the majority of the yard’s horses, in helping out at the parade, while Fred Philipson-Stow and novice rider Jimmy Munro, who each rode for the stable last season, and former novice champion Ed Vaughan were also among those holding a rein.

Barber added of Grace A Vous Enki: “He’s come back in [from a summer break] and is showing all his old enthusiasm. We’ll try to keep him unbeaten [from his present home].”

In a glorious setting of rolling hills reminiscent of scenes from The Sound Of Music, Barber, with support from partner Ella Orttewell, is preparing to launch into a third season from his current base. It was created and is owned by licensed trainer Clive Boultbee-Brooks whose home and yard is nearby and who shares gallops with Barber. Prior to his move Barber was based in Dorset where his grandfather, Richard, trained and became a legend within point-to-pointing through churning out hundreds of winners, including four in Cheltenham’s Foxhunters’ Chase, plus a success in Aintree’s equivalent.

Barber addresses the audience of owners and invited guests during his open day (Ce)

Barber matched that in 2023 when saddling Famous Clermont to win Aintree’s Foxhunters’ Chase. Famous Clermont went on to win six hunters’ chases and 12 point-to-points, although a hock injury he incurred towards the end of last season has led to his retirement. Barber expects the 11-year-old to become a hunter next year.

While point-to-pointing welcomes the one-horse owner/trainer/rider the sport looks quite different from the one which flourished in the final third of the last century when farmers trained their own horses and were the backbone of the sport. Rural life and farming practices were evolving and ‘livery yards’ run by professional trainers came to the fore. Barber’s set-up typifies contemporary training of pointers, albeit with adjustments, including a ‘young-horse system’. Bloodstock agent Ed Bailey has a key role in sourcing the material.

A three-year-old Doctor Dino gelding, typical of the young horses who are being prepared at the yard (Ce)

Barber said: “We have a lot of young horses here, which is the key to what we are doing. Clive came up with the idea of buying younger horses because Irish point-to-pointers have become so expensive. The idea is to buy foals and yearlings, put them through our young-horse system and then create a plan for them. We break them in as late yearlings, and then do a whole season with them as two-year-olds, but very steadily.

“We do a little bit and back off, then do another little bit and back off again. We find that way they physically develop quicker and you get more idea of a route you can take with them, be that to go point-to-pointing, junior hurdling or into a bumper.”

Did he feel a wrench in leaving the county of his birth? He said: “I have friends in Dorset, but moving here wasn’t so different because I’ve got good mates like Ed Bailey and Richard Patrick living nearby and Ed [Doggrell] has now come here, too. I feel privileged to train here because Clive has some brilliant facilities which we use.

All Star Boy, who in January 2025 became Barber’s first winner from his current yard (Ce)

“It’s going to be very difficult to beat last season’s total of wins, but we have some very good horses to go into battle. They include some who have to step up in grade and it won’t be so easy for them. We won’t change anything – if they are good enough to win they will and if they’re not they won’t.

“I was surprised by the score we achieved last season – our target is to have as many winners as we have hunters’ certificates, which would have been around 25, but it just kept building as the season went on. I’m very lucky that we have a good team of staff and good riders coming in for schooling.”

Barber’s season will commence at Lower Machen although he is only expecting to saddle one runner, Queenswood, a four-year-old daughter of Dink and who finished fourth on her sole outing to date in an Irish point-to-point. Having been bred in Britain and with full Great British Bonus options she could generate a handsome return if successful in Machen’s GB Pointing Young Horse Maiden race and followed that up with success under rules.

Full throttle for the yard will come a little later. He said: “We’ll hopefully have a strong team for Chaddesley Corbett [December 6] which has become our local track, but we won’t be running anything unless we get a lot of rain.”

Carrillo, who won three of four races last season and is being aimed at Chaddesley Corbett’s opening meeting (Ce)

Horses who showed ability last season include five-year-old Carrillo, who won three out of four and twice defeated the Will Biddick-trained Dollanstown, a horse who then completed a hat-trick before the curtain’s fall. Barber said of the Nick & Alison Hitchings-owned Carrillo: “He’s got some big targets and will start off at Chaddesley Corbett,” while of Paul and Sara Thorman’s Couer D’Alene he said: “He’s a lovely horse, but he has to step up now he’s into open class.” The six-year-old has won six of his seven most recent starts under King or Doggrell. The Thormans’ also own All Star Boy, who became Barber’s first winner from his current base when landing an 11-runner restricted race at Larkhill in January 2025. “Everything that finished behind has won since,” said the trainer.

There was a hint of frustration in his voice as he reviewed Jewel In The Park’s latest season. The six-year-old, one of a number of horses in the yard by champion sire Walk In The Park, was unbeaten in five races for the Always Broke Partnership, although that included a walk-over, while on another occasion he was withdrawn from a race after his sole opponent pulled out.

Jewel In The Park, who could run in Larkhill’s two-and-a-half mile open race in November (Ce)

Barber said: “He won nicely at Dunsmore, then had a bit of time off before he came back [in the spring], but people kept running away from him. He shows plenty of speed and will hopefully go to Larkhill [November 29] for the two-and-a-half miler.”

Newcomers to the yard include Crackling Fire, a six-year-old son of Walk In The Park who showed some ability in four runs for Olly Murphy’s stable, including when third of six, beaten just two lengths by the winner, in a hurdle race at Uttoxeter in March. He looks a likely maiden winner as does Maximum Exposure, a four-year-old who had four runs in Irish point-to-points earlier this year. “He wasn’t getting home over three miles on soft ground so we will be looking for a two-and-a-half mile maiden on good ground for him,” said Barber.

Malt Master, a new recruit who was bought for £4,000 in May via ThoroughBid after finishing fourth in an Irish point-to-point (Ce)

Among unraced and often unnamed horses to watch out for is a three-year-old half-sister to Carrillo by Order Of St George out of the mare Shannon Theatre. Barber said: “She’s very forward, a pocket rocket. She knows she’s a rock star,” while a Blue Bresil gelding out of a Galileo mare was said to be: “A lovely, lovely horse with a phenomenal walk.”

A Doctor Dino three-year-old gelding called Sophiste who was bought at Goffs’ Arkle Sale for €45,000 was said to be “very, very fast and hopefully one we can make a bit of money on”, while another purchase at that auction – but one year earlier – a €25,000 son of Blue Bresil out of Glory Days and therefore a half-brother to the Twiston-Davies stable’s smart chaser Top Of The Bill, was said to be “weak and raw last year, but ready to go fairly early this time around”.

A wonderful place to train horses amid rolling Herefordshire hills (Ce)