BRINGING HOME THE SILVERWARE ON A DAY FREE OF FEAR

Thirteen days ago, a mixed round of jumping by Grangeclare Diego at Charm Park had culminated in Paddy Barlow's unseat five from home and, you'll recall, a mammoth delay whilst medical services attended to the unconscious jockey amid a hushed and concerned atmosphere.

Fast forward to today, and here we all are watching the same Grangeclare Diego swagger into the winner's enclosure at the Hurworth point-to-point at Hutton Rudby, having not touched a twig all the way round under the same Paddy Barlow.

A quite extraordinary example of pointing's perpetual gift for effecting turnrounds in fortunes, this; one mirrored further by Buster Valentine, on whom Paddy had won 35 minutes before his Charm Park spill, decking him 35 minutes after today's victory (rider thankfully unscathed this time).

Points of interest were not hard to find on a day when two-thirds of the horses that could have turned up thankfully did, and the rain that also could have turned up politely waited until the final race was concluded.

Isobel MacTaggart and Katriona Brown recorded first career riding successes, whilst John Dawson dug deep to secure the opener on Mount Mews as if the previous day's exertions at Cheltenham had taken nothing out of him.

The Hurworth qualified Sine Nomine was, to the best of my knowledge, nowhere to be seen. The magnificent cup she won, however, was. Yesterday's victory was very much one by, for, and to be enjoyed and shared with, Yorkshire pointing.

A final observation. In a chat with the excellent Mike Crolla between commentaries, we recalled that the 2020 renewal of this fixture had fallen just three days before the entire country was placed in lockdown (indeed, this was my first return visit since).

The atmosphere that day had been tangibly shot through with a sense of sadness, uncertainty and - if we're all honest about it - fear of a kind I'd never sensed on a racetrack before, and perhaps never will again.

That it has been possible to renew my acquaintance with Skutterskelfe Park liberated from any such foreboding has given me more pleasure today than I am perhaps able to convey adequately here. May we all live long before our sport experiences anything similar or the same once more.