Sporting life

In a study conducted on families that participate in racing, it was found that racing is actually in the blood. This photographic essay does justice to that assertion by capturing the lives of four families that have racing in their blood – Chirnside, Hoysted, Inglis and Hutchinson. A thoroughbred or blood horse is a horse especially bred for racing, and when one checks the ancestral lines of such a horse, it can be traced without interruptions to ancestors that are recorded in the General Stud Book. Today, every thoroughbred horse can trace their male line back to any of these three – Godolphin Arabian, Darley Arabian, or Byerly Turk. These three horses were bred in the 17th and 18th centuries, and it is their bloodlines that serve as the major foundation of thoroughbred racing. When it comes to horses, the family is very important and even more important for a horse that races. For families of those who race with horses today, the ancestral lines might be more complex, but it is also enduring and impressive. No matter which aspect of horse racing a person decides to deal in, whether it is Punter, trainer, jockey, breeder, bookmaker, or owner, one will discover that racing goes down a long line and most times, it can be found in one generation after another. The history of racing families is filled with stories of uncles who trained horses, cousins who won or almost won, and many tales like that.