Last month we received the sad news from the Racehorse Re-Homing Centre in Somerset that Korakor had passed away. He was 29 years old.
Korakor enjoyed plenty of success on the track for John and Barbara Cotton, winning seven times in all from 58 lifetime starts. Although he won over 2m, his best trip was 2m4f and he was successful for us at Ayr and Doncaster, although his best effort possibly came at Aintree when running 3rd in the Topham in 2002.
The Cottons were early investors in the French market and had success from 2000 with horses trained in the UK and France. Their biggest win came in 2005 when Golden Flight won the Prix La Hoye Jousselin at Auteuil.
When John Cotton was interviewed in 2021 about his horses, he said “One of my favourite horses who came from Guillaume Macaire in France was Korakor. He did well in the UK but at Sandown (2005) a horse knocked into him, and he wasn’t able to race again. He’s still around and happy in his retirement.”
The following essay was written in 2018 and is taken from the excellent Racehorse Re-Homing Centre
The most beautiful eyes that you would ever see on a horse was on Kokopops. It was the first thing everyone noticed when they met him. Coupled with a gold encrusted coat he was everyone’s favourite. By no means was Kokes a novice riders horse, he was a good chaser in his time and did not take to be left behind too kindly. Due to a very nasty injury to his hock, he would never be in the show ring, or do dressage but he did enjoy himself pleasure rides and a bit of show jumping. He was brilliant, but when it came to double fillers he had a problem, not having a furlong in between was alien to him. Kokes did go to a home and was very happy for 5 years, but sadly was returned due to family commitments.
He returned with a gum disease called gingeivitus which left him with no front teeth at all, and now his tongue often hangs outside his mouth giving him a rather cheeky appearance! But this horse is not only beautiful he is also resourceful and has learnt how to ‘tug’ the grass out of the ground. This does mean that he decides the ‘grass is always greener’ where he is NOT allowed to go and using his jumping skills to get into a field (or even a lawn) different to the one he has been left in! ????
He certainly has no problem maintaining a good waistline! Kokes, now 24 years old, does a wonderful job looking after our new arrivals, befriending them, showing them the ropes and making them feel welcome. He is still a firm favourite with both horses and volunteers alike! ❤