Cambridgeshire Countryfile

-ELLIE HARRISON:

-Cambridgeshire - a patchwork of fields

and vast, open fenland.

I'm on the border of Cambridgeshire and Suffolk, in Newmarket,

the antithesis of a one-horse town.

For the past 350 years, it's been an equine epicentre.

What makes Newmarket famous isn't really its racetrack -

58 other towns have them - but its historic heathland.

And that's what makes Warren Hill Gallops one of the best

training grounds for horse and rider in the country.

While most of us are still contemplating breakfast,

this place is alive with the sound of thundering hooves.

These gallops are the heart of the whole racing scene

that Newmarket is built on.

I'm meeting Nick Patton, whose job it is to maintain the heathland.

-What about it is so good?

-We've been here since the 1600s.

It's a fantastic bit of land.

It's so free draining, fantastic grass gallops.

There's everything here that the trainer wants.

It must take a lot of work to maintain this.

-That's your job, right? You and your team.

-Yeah.

-What have you got to do to keep this up?

-It's a 365-day-a-year operation.

We've got 2,500 acres here

and 90 miles of all-weather artificial gallops,

and of course, you know, we've had a long, hard winter,

and even in the hardest winters

we'll be able to keep the artificial gallops open and operational,

so when airports and highways are closed,

we're still getting horses out here to train.

So, we're on grass here now. Surely that's just a bit of mowing, is it?

Yeah, you would think so.

This is one of our peat moss gallops that we've got here.

Ever since the Second World War, a layer of peat has been added to it.

-What, every year?

-Not every year. Every second year now.

And worked into it.

So it always retains that little bit of moisture,

so even in the driest conditions,

it still adds a bit of cushion for the horses to gallop on.

To keep the legendary gallops in fine form, Nick employs

a team of heathmen to make sure the going is consistently good.

As well as the peat moss grass gallops,

there's an all-weather artificial track.

It looks more like the contents of a vacuum cleaner bag to me.

-It's predominantly sand...

-Oh, yeah.

-..fibre,

little bits of PVC rubber, all joined together with wax.

We're trying to mimic a turf surface,

so it's got a bit of spring and bounce to it.

What is that for?

Every now and again we just check the compaction of the surface,

so we will push that in and feel how compacted the surface is.

We'll rotovate it a bit deeper or work the surface a bit deeper

if that's getting a bit firm underneath.

There are currently 80 racehorse trainers

exercising just over 2,500 horses on these gallops every day.

William Haggas has been training his horses here for 25 years.

What is it that makes Newmarket so good?

We've just got everything here.

Absolutely. We got every grass gallop you can imagine.

We've got... We can go right handed, left handed.

We've got all-weather surfaces that go right handed, left handed,

uphill, downhill even. We've got everything.

A trainer's job has got so many things involved with it,

I guess anything from finances to physio,

but this moment where they're really letting rip

and galloping, that must be a special thing for you?

It's a joyous thing, doing what we do. It's fantastic,

especially good in the summer when it's light and warm.

No better job than this.

The historic heathland may be at the heart of racehorsing,

but later I'll be visiting its headquarters,

the place where the racing rule book was written.

JOHN CRAVEN: In the heart of Cambridgeshire

stands Ely Cathedral -

majestic, awe-inspiring.

Once it was surrounded by water,

and it's always been known as "the ship of the Fens".

It's easy to imagine how this great building,

appearing through the mists,

offered the promise of refuge and safety to weary pilgrims.

For centuries, the cathedral has dominated the surrounding landscape,

and I'm here today to watch and to listen to

a remarkable experiment involving its world-famous octagon tower.

Created in the 14th century,

it's a masterpiece of medieval design and engineering.

Well, I've just climbed 165 steps to the top of the octagon,

and I'm now amongst the angels.

Now, seven sides of this tower are said to represent everyday life,

the seven days of the week. But the eighth side represents eternity,

hence the angels.

The angels guide the faithful to the heights of heaven,

with Christ at its centre.

Centuries ago, the Benedictine choir stood in exactly this spot,

and from here, their voices reached up

to the uppermost heights of the tower.

In medieval times,

the monks had their choir stalls directly underneath the octagon.

In fact, some of them would be up there, 50 metres high,

and the idea was that their voices would unite heaven and earth.

Well, it's an interesting theory, but would it really work?

We're going to try it out now with the help of the choristers

and their director of music. What do you think, Paul?

Is it possible to hear voices from right up there?

It's a story we've heard a number of times.

Whether we're actually going to hear it well

and whether it's going to work at this kind of distance

is something we just don't know,

because we've never tried it before.

We've got four of our choristers

right up there in the angel windows,

we've got the main group down here...

We're going to do it!

# He's got the whole wide world in his hands

# He's got the whole wide world in his hands

# He's got the whole wide world in his hands

# He's got the world in his hands

# He's got the tiny little hedgehogs in his hands

# He's got the tiny little hedgehogs in his hands

# He's got the tiny little hedgehogs in his hands

# He's got the whole world in his hands

# He's got the whole world in his hands

# He's got the whole world in his hands. #

-It worked, didn't it?

-You did it.

-Yeah, well done.

Well done!

JOHN LAUGHS

Now, there's a very good reason why

the choristers have just been singing about hedgehogs.

For centuries, this cathedral has been a sanctuary for pilgrims,

but now it's also about to become a safe haven for hedgehogs as well.

Out in the cathedral grounds, head gardener Aine Rodriguez

is putting the finishing touches to a temporary hedgehog pen.

This is an example. We've made three separate houses,

-because apparently they like their own space, John.

-Right.

-And the houses have been made from recycled wood.

-You built this?

Yeah, from offcuts of wood.

Not quite as elaborate as the building I've just been in.

No, not at all. That's taken centuries.

-Well, that's awesome.

-Thank you.

-All we need now are some hedgehogs.

-Exactly.

So, here come the new arrivals.

-Let's take them to meet their new home, shall we?

-Absolutely.

Heading up the release scheme at the Shepreth Hedgehog Hospital

is Rebecca Willis.

How long would you like them to be in the pen for?

Ideally 10 to 14 days, if possible, just to acclimatise them.

They've been in a hospital environment, some for many months,

so this is what they need just to give them a bit of a boost.

What's that little blue tag on him?

Well, he's known as 45,

this is his number all throughout.

When they come in to us, we track them from day one,

when the person will bring them in,

because they've been underweight or injured.

They're given a tracking number and the idea is that if you,

or anyone in the area, sees this one,

you know it's one of ours, we can come straight back.

Little nose coming up there.

Hedgehogs are in serious decline, aren't they? How bad is it?

Oh, it's serious.

If you look back to the 1950s, there are estimates of maybe 32 million.

Today, we're lucky if we've probably got a million left in the UK.

They're being hit, motor cars, hedgerows are disappearing

where you would naturally find them...

If we should find one in our back garden, what should we do?

OK, if you find it at night, that's not a problem,

-that should be normal, healthy behaviour.

-Just leave it?

-Yes.

If you want to put food out, that's great. If you want put cat food out.

Water is super. Most importantly, if you find it out during the day,

you've got to contact someone straight away.

-If you see one in the daytime?

-That's not right. That's dehydration,

that might be parasitic load, it could be injured.

Newmarket, the headquarters of British horse racing.

The Jockey Club Rooms have been the countryside seat

of Britain's most influential racing body for more than 250 years.

There's a world-famous private members' club

few people have had the privilege of stepping inside.

Within these four walls, a rare glimpse into the proud

and quirky history of British horse racing.

Room steward Alan Medlock is giving me

a guided tour through the corridors of power.

Decisions made here shaped horse racing as we know it today,

and this chap, Henry Rous, wrote the rule book.

He was the man who pulled all the rules and regulations that existed

by word of mouth and wrote them down,

and invented the handicapping system.

They pull together the registration of silks

and the colours that horses ride under, and also weighing.

So he was the man who put all this structure into racing.

And it still exists to this day.

-So he deserves his place on the wall?

-Oh, absolutely.

-Essential part of the industry.

-Excellent.

Another horse...

Another horse, another horse...

Well, this is the Coffee Room, the spiritual home of The Jockey Club.

What about in here? What are these little cubbyholes?

These were the areas where people would meet and congregate,

-making book.

-What does that mean?

-Bookmakers.

Probably this group here might be offering, say,

7-2 if you bet 5,000 guineas.

Another group might be offering slightly better odds

if you put 10,000 guineas.

And in 1827, we know that in one bet,

a gentleman called John Gully,

a notorious gambler,

lost £40,000 on one race.

-In today's terms, that's £2.8 million.

-Wow.

So who WERE these people? Why did they have so much money to gamble?

Landed gentry and dukes and peers of the realm,

and knights, and goodness knows what else.

-So, fortunes were won and lost here?

-And probably estates.

-SHE LAUGHS

-Wow.

Well, we're going into the Morning Room now,

and of all the pictures in here,

the most important one is this one of Eclipse.

When they started to keep a record of bloodlines,

a crucial aspect of breeding horses, he is number one.

If you buy a thoroughbred horse anywhere in the world,

96% of the bloodlines can be traced

back through the male line to Eclipse.

Goodness, he's the grand-daddy of them all.

He is the grand-daddy of them all. When he died

and they performed an autopsy on him,

they found that he had a 14.5lb heart.

Average horse is 10, 10.5lb,

so you've got a 40% supercharger.

What's this? This looks a bit macabre.

It's one of the hooves of Eclipse, that was presented

to The Jockey Club in 1832 by King William IV

to mark the work that The Jockey Club were doing in racing.

This is a snuff box?

Snuff box, inkwells, they were made in different forms,

but this one, I would imagine, would be a stuff box.

While The Jockey Club no longer makes the rules, it still invests

money to ensure the long-term success of this sport of kings.