Golden Rules owner Cheshire eager to be Plate smasher
Cheshire's bullish pre-race predictions grabbed the headlines ahead of the 'Pitmen's Derby' in 2023 and after going agonisingly close, he has redemption on his mind ahead of this latest visit to the north east.
'I haven't slept for three weeks and I certainly won't be sleeping until Saturday,' said Cheshire.
'I've renamed the Northumberland Plate as 'unfinished business' and I'm really looking forward to it. I live and breathe this horse and I will never get another like him if I live to 1000.'
Golden Rules was trained by Deborah Faulkner when hitting the crossbar in the Gosforth Park feature two years ago, but it is now her son Thomas overseeing the fragile eight-year-old's precision preparations after another 600-day plus absence for the team to contend with.
The gelding returned from his latest layoff in the exact same Kempton contest (Queen's Prize Handicap) he did in March 2023 and has since been meticulously pointed to the Northumberland Plate.
And in another case of deja vu, Cheshire will once again swap the White Isle of Ibiza for Tyneside to watch his pride and joy in action.
Cheshire added: 'He's a horse of a lifetime for me at my level and at 3.20pm on Saturday you could have witnessed the training performance of the year because the effort that goes into this horse in unbelievable.
'The days are almost exactly the same as what we tried in 2023 and it's all been planned to the minute for Saturday.
'Again like in 2023 I've had to cut short my holiday to Ibiza to go to Newcastle which hasn't gone down too well and no doubt there will be another handbag involved, but fingers crossed it goes well.
'They have done an unbelievable job with this horse and even though Tommy (Faulkner) has tried to put a complete media ban on me, I am supremely confident.'
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Telegraph
an hour ago
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Horse racing tips: Friday, June 27
It's the second day of Newcastle's Northumberland Plate meeting and our betting expert Ron Wood, who has been among the winners again this week, has tips for the two main races. Ron Wood's selections NAP: Diamond Rain (7.05, Newcastle) 1pt win @ 4/5 with William Hill ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Other: Dutch Kingdom (7.35, Newcastle) 1pt win @ 40/1 with William Hill ⭐⭐⭐ Odds provided by William Hill and correct at the time of writing. Stars denote strength of selection (max 5). If you already have a William Hill account and are looking for a new bookmaker to use for this week's racing, check out more free bets from the best betting sites, reviewed by our experts. 7.05 Newcastle – Fillies' Stakes (Group 3, 1m 2f) The Charlie Appleby-trained DIAMOND RAIN (NAP) is justifiably a short price. She has a cracking pedigree – her dam won the 2011 Oaks – and she has won two Listed races, most recently when justifying strong market support last month on her reappearance at Haydock. The switch to the all-weather ought to suit as her sire, Shamardal, gets plenty of winners on artificial surfaces, while the stiff track is also in her favour as she's not short on stamina. 7.35 Newcastle – Gosforth Park Cup Handicap (Class 2, 5f) DUTCH KINGDOM has struggled on his last couple of starts, but the latest came on turf and he comes into this after a seven-week break. He can go well fresh and this test looks like suiting him. He has made the top two in 10 of his 19 starts on the all-weather, winning seven times, which compares favourably to a 0-8 turf record that does not include any top-three finishes. This will be his first start over course or distance, but this is a stiff test at the trip and it's a set-up that could unlock some more progress from him. Selection: Dutch Kingdom @ 40/1 with William Hill If you want to find more odds and offers, take a look at our list of the best betting sites and free bets Today's UK and Irish racing (Flat unless stated) Doncaster 1.50-5.05 Yarmouth 2.00-5.15 Cartmel (NH) 2.38-5.30 Newcastle 4.45-8.40 Curragh 4.50-8.30 Newmarket 5.40-8.55 What does NAP mean? NAP is a word used in betting circles to describe a prediction that a tipster thinks has a particularly strong chance of winning. Many horse racing tipsters pick out a 'NAP of the day', which is their favoured selection from all the races across the different meetings. The term NAP derives from the French card game Napoleon. When players of this game thought they had a particularly strong hand that they would win with, they would shout 'Napoleon'. What is an each-way bet? An each-way bet is a popular type of wager, particularly with horse racing fans. It is essentially two bets, both of which have the same size stake. An each-way bet features one bet on the selection to win and the other bet on the selection to place. So a £10 each-way bet will cost you a total of £20. There will be one £10 bet on the selection to win and another £10 on the selection to place. It's a popular bet because it offers punters the chance of a return, even if the horse in question fails to win. Bookmakers will pay out at a stated percentage of the odds for a place finish, for example one-fifth of the starting price (SP) for finishing in the first three. The more runners there are in a horse race, the more places will be on offer. In races that feature lots of runners, the horses will be available at bigger odds, making an each-way bet a wise choice. Ron Wood 2025 horse racing P/L (up to and including Wednesday June 25) Star ratings explained ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ - confident selection ⭐⭐⭐⭐ - strong fancy ⭐⭐⭐ - fair claims ⭐⭐ - tentative choice ⭐ - minimum confidence If you want to find more odds and offers, take a look at our list of the best betting sites and free bets Check out our list of the best casino bonuses in the UK
Times
3 hours ago
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Padel is the UK's new obsession. Meet the companies making it happen
Like many of the UK's growing ranks of padel devotees, Sammy Arora, 24, was hooked from his first swing of the racket. It was seven years ago, and he was sharing a court with his family, 'who hadn't really played sports before' but still managed a decent rally. As the Aroras found, padel is easy to pick up, regardless of age or fitness. Often described as tennis with walls — which the ball can bounce off — it is the UK's fastest-growing sport. It wasn't until Arora's university days in Durham, where he wrote his dissertation on the potential growth of padel, that he began to mould his passion for the sport into a business idea. 'I spoke to my dad and he said, 'It's a great opportunity, you've got to do it.'' • Explore the Sunday Times 100 — interviews, company profiles and more His father, Bobby Arora, knows a good business opportunity when he sees one: he is a multimillionaire who made his fortune from building the budget retailer B&M. He put up the majority of the £450,000 Sammy needed to open his first Pure Padel club in Cheshire, with three courts and a shop. 'I managed to balance my last year of uni and starting the business', Arora says. 'My first site opened in October 2023, about five months after I graduated.' Now, just over two years since sitting his finals (he got a 2:1), Arora is among the entrepreneurs feeding the craze for padel in the UK. It has drawn 400,000 players at last count, David Beckham and Stormzy among them. The Lawn Tennis Association, the sport's governing body, says there are now 893 padel courts at 300 venues across Britain. These courts can be indoors, often in converted warehouses; or outdoors, either exposed to the elements or covered by a giant canopy. Arora is hedging his bets and creating a mix because 'no one really knows' which will prove the most popular in the long run. Pure Padel now has five clubs, with another seven planned this year. His father continues to finance the business, having so far invested £1.4 million together with other friends and family, some of whom also assist in running the venture. Sammy's uncle, Simon Arora, B&M's former chief executive, is 'helping on the legal leases and land deals'. Paul McDonald, the retailer's former chief financial officer, is 'helping with the company finances'. • The No 1 networking spot now? The padel court The result, so far, has been sales of £1.6 million in the eight months to the end of March 2025. The young company hasn't yet achieved the propulsion to make it on to the main Sunday Times 100 table. But it is one of a growing number of padel startups — our Ones to Watch — that have flourished in parallel with padel's growth in the UK. When Michael Gradon started another of our promising future stars, the club operator Game4Padel, in 2019 'most people hadn't even heard of the sport' and thought it was a 'mad idea', he says. But Gradon, 66, had already caught the bug, having played padel in Spain, home to 5.5 million players. 'We managed to persuade Andy Murray to come in as a small investor,' says Gradon, a former Wimbledon board member. Other investors, including the footballers Virgil van Dijk and Jamie Vardy, have since handed the business more than £10 million, for a valuation of £27 million. Game4Padel now runs 21 padel clubs in the UK and four overseas, and generated sales of £2.4 million last year. It plans to open about ten more clubs this year, but Gradon notes the UK is still far behind countries like Spain. 'We're still in the very early stages of the boom,' he says. Operators including Game4Padel sometimes pair their padel offering with pickleball, another fast-growing racket sport, played on a smaller court with a slower ball. But whereas padel courts can cost about £160,000 to build when an overhead canopy is included, a tennis court — or even indoor badminton courts — can be easily converted to pickleball. It just requires a lower net and some lines, meaning local groups of players can improvise with existing facilities. Yet finding business success with padel isn't easy. As well as the expense of building courts, planning permission and building regulations can mean projects take years to bring to fruition. Then there is the noise: complaints from nearby residents about the noise of hard shots add to the challenges of site selection. But that hasn't stopped enthusiasts rushing headlong into the market. Gradon likens it to a 'gold rush'. Paul Regan, whose company, Pro Padel Courts, has six years' experience in installing courts, says clueless construction companies are flooding the market, some of which 'cut corners on groundworks which fail, and courts have fallen down'. A serial entrepreneur, Regan expects his company to build about 100 courts this year, almost doubling its present tally. He thinks this will lift sales beyond the £900,000 his company served up in the 12 months to February. Regan, who is also a former tennis coach, is in little doubt that padel will 'overtake tennis very quickly' in the UK. Part of the appeal is the social aspect of the game. Operators like Pure Padel and The Padel Club are opening bars and cafés alongside courts. Also, as Arora says, compared with sports like tennis, 'it's a lot more informal, you can wear trackie bottoms'. • Meet the padel addicts spending £100 a week Pure Padel, Game4Padel and the like — others among our Ones to Watch include Padel4All and Smash Padel — are up against more established businesses that have turned their attention to the sport. Slazenger Padel Clubs, backed by Frasers Group, and the five-a-side football provider Powerleague are spending millions to roll out courts. 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Leader Live
15 hours ago
- Leader Live
Golden Rules owner Cheshire eager to be Plate smasher
Cheshire's bullish pre-race predictions grabbed the headlines ahead of the 'Pitmen's Derby' in 2023 and after going agonisingly close, he has redemption on his mind ahead of this latest visit to the north east. 'I haven't slept for three weeks and I certainly won't be sleeping until Saturday,' said Cheshire. 'I've renamed the Northumberland Plate as 'unfinished business' and I'm really looking forward to it. I live and breathe this horse and I will never get another like him if I live to 1000.' Golden Rules was trained by Deborah Faulkner when hitting the crossbar in the Gosforth Park feature two years ago, but it is now her son Thomas overseeing the fragile eight-year-old's precision preparations after another 600-day plus absence for the team to contend with. The gelding returned from his latest layoff in the exact same Kempton contest (Queen's Prize Handicap) he did in March 2023 and has since been meticulously pointed to the Northumberland Plate. And in another case of deja vu, Cheshire will once again swap the White Isle of Ibiza for Tyneside to watch his pride and joy in action. Cheshire added: 'He's a horse of a lifetime for me at my level and at 3.20pm on Saturday you could have witnessed the training performance of the year because the effort that goes into this horse in unbelievable. 'The days are almost exactly the same as what we tried in 2023 and it's all been planned to the minute for Saturday. 'Again like in 2023 I've had to cut short my holiday to Ibiza to go to Newcastle which hasn't gone down too well and no doubt there will be another handbag involved, but fingers crossed it goes well. 'They have done an unbelievable job with this horse and even though Tommy (Faulkner) has tried to put a complete media ban on me, I am supremely confident.'
