Foxglove March 11 2009

Under their saddles and over their loins lie good woollen blankets, gold-coloured, striped with navy and red in the traditional pattern.

The horses sidle and two-step and tap-dance their way along the lane, tails blowing against their hocks, heads tossing, delicate mouths feeling for their length of rein. The riders, muffled on top and lean below, sit there as if nothing is happening: by their standards, nothing is.

The horses are a whisker away from being race-fit, for you cannot keep any athlete, human or animal, at complete fitness for long without doing damage, and therefore their fitness is only brought to peak for a particular race.

Some horses can get bad-tempered when they are ready to race; whatever their normal character is, being so fit tends to make them more reactive. They are, after all, a species that survives by running away, and Thoroughbreds above all breeds of horse have "gallop" as default mode.

The riders are taciturn but miss nothing, feeling how their horses feel, seeing what the horses see, keeping ahead of the game. As one of my trainer friends once said to me: "A Thoroughbred has done it and forgotten about it while another horse is still contemplating it".

They settle into their string now, a long grate of hoof on tarmac here and a shower of sparks there where shoe meets road at a suitable speed and angle, but mostly even-stepping, their heads swinging like pendulums to balance the thrust of their quarters.

Up to where the lane meets the track they go, turning left onto the mud left by the rain, cutting their shoes' shapes in the earth with every stride. Above, I see the kestrel hovering, then swinging sideways in a great arc and dropping to the ground, making excuse enough for one of the horses to curvet and leap, though his rider does not move in the saddle.

Now they are where the ground allows faster work, where turf is almost as pampered as racehorses. Grass gallops are not so common nowadays; in my day an all-weather track was a rarity. Quick as thought, the riders snap their leathers up to the length they like for fast work, their horses knowing what that means and making the second leather more difficult than the first as they edge and spin towards the beginning of the gallops.

Then up the green they fly, two abreast, keeping their distance and keeping their place, nice and steady in racehorse terms, then letting them out for the uphill blast. Sitting up and dropping your reins is the signal for the horses to slow down: mostly it works.

Will you go to the point-to-point? It is well worth it, and our own Parham is a lovely course for spectating as well as for riding. All over Sussex and further away as well, horses and riders are getting fit just as I have seen this morning.

The sun is warm, the wind is chill, the horses step daintily down another track to the road that will take them home, and I have another route to go and a different job to do. My step feels as light and easy as theirs for the lovely pause in my day that was watching the horses.