Alastair Down: Much cause for celebration after a people's result for a people's race.

AFTER a week when some of the game's mega-rich were making the headlines in the sales ring savaging each other with their bank drafts, racing returned to it roots yesterday when Katy Nowaitee stormed away with the Cambridgeshire.

Katy Nowaitee is owned by a 12-strong syndicate which includes an engineer, a tennis coach, a publican and nine others on the deliriously happy side of ecstatic.

It was yet another syndicate triumph for Peter Harris who, despite having hundreds of millions under what must be a distinctly lumpy mattress, has mastered the art of syndicating horses to the humble and looking after them in style at his Tring headquarters.

These great handicaps are very much the people's races and this was a people's result, with the owners paying the comparatively accessible figure of a couple of hundred quid a month in training fees.

Back in the spring, Katy Nowaitee was an impressive winner of the consolation Lincoln at Doncaster and, at the time, there was some extraordinary talk doing the rounds that she was thought to be about 20lb ahead of the handicapper.

One thing for sure is that Harris had confided that he believed the filly to be Listed class, so it was not surprising she was sent off at 7-1 favourite in a field of 23 off a mark of 84 at Donny.

Usually when the racecourse rumour-mill comes up with lines like `20lb in hand'

you take it with a pinch of salt and tell your informant to take it with a bit more water.

But on this occasion there was some truth in it, and the Harris team thought she could be a serious proposition for the Hunt Cup off an 8lb higher mark.

But throat infections and back problems intervened and everyone involved, from Harris to the Delighted Dozen, stressed that this victory owed a huge amount to Katy Nowaitee's lass, Alison Ashby, who has religiously carried out the chiropractor's instructions on a daily basis.

So the Cambridgeshire became the plan, and this was a case of a good thing coming to those who waited. Certainly, a number of the owners had a right touch here, playing at 25-1, 20-1 and 16-1 in a gamble that really caught hold on course, levering the filly in through all rates from 10-1 to an SP of 6-1.

Barnet publican Frank Coen, a native of Galway-where they get taught the fine art of celebration at primary school-was one of those who had the boots on.

He said: "I had 600 people in the pub last night and I must have told them all to back her. She did the most sensational piece of work with a fair yardstick in Mantusis last Friday and I must confess I was on the phone to the bookmakers on the way home. There won't be many happy bookies in Barnet today.

"I'm not going to the pub tonight, and I wouldn't be surprised if I spend a couple of weeks in the Betty Ford Clinic before I make it back there."

In terms of the race itself, Katy Nowaitee put up an outstanding performance in what is a very demanding test. Travelling strongly in the five-strong group up the far side, John Reid sent her ahead two furlongs out and she was never in the slightest danger, beating Nooshman, for whom everything went right for once, by one and three-quarter lengths, with third-placed Pinchincha another Pricewise crunch to the bookies' solar plexus, backed from 40-1 and 33-1 in the morning all the way down to 16-1.

It was a shocking Cambridgeshire for the bookmakers, with the first four home all very well-backed and only the eclipse of Bound For Pleasure preventing a complete whitewash. It brings tears to the eyes.

But just as much as the bookies' woes, there was some real pleasure to be had from this result. Racing could have few better advertisements than 12 happy owners sardining on to the winner's rostrum after a pounds 70,000 race at Headquarters .

The last time we had such a big day for the small owner was when another Harris flier, Primo Valentino, won last year's Middle Park.

The Flat is largely the preserve of the vast battalions, but not exclusively so-as Katy Nowaitee proved to us again yesterday.

A good thing for connections, those who joined in the gamble and for the eternal dream of all owners-and a reminder that anything is possible.