STALKING COUNT ORLOV'S TROTTING HORSES: 1989

It was a long shot.  That Moscow's great expert on horse breeding and racing would answer a letter I dropped into a suburban California mailbox seemed as likely as our ten-year old mare winning the Kentucky Derby. But the name Konstantin Petrovich Bochkarov had been sent to me by the American Trotting Horse Association with the suggestion that he might take me back in time to the century when Count Alexei Orlov, with a substantial grant from Empress Catherine, developed an entirely new breed, the Orlov Trotter, the fastest horse in its class.   Information about this elegant animal was sorely lacking in the United States, and my attempt to contact Bochkarov was made in the last year of Soviet rule when letters did not flow easily between the two countries.   The odds that I would get any response at all from this highly placed bureaucrat were 30 to 1...the cost of an airmail stamp.

My letter to the Ministry of Agriculture had been couched in second-grade printing.  Even if Bochkarov read no English, he could not fail to understand if I wrote simple sentences in large letters.  Long shots do occasionally pay off although after a month of waiting I was convinced that the letter of inquiry had been filed, incinerated or censored into senselessness.

Until one day a rather ragged airmail envelope laden with Sputnik stamps came to my door.  The letter from K.P. Bochkarov was written in flawless, idiomatic English and crafted in flowing 19th century script.  It promised copies of his articles on the Orlov in translation, all the photos I could use, and with the letter came a fat pack of pictures of the horse in action.  Incidentally, he added, would I send him equine stamps for his collection and a knitting book for his wife?

Count Alexei Orlov

Detente bloomed.  Over the next months we exchanged letters as fast as the balkyRussian system allowed.  But my information still lacked immediacy which no amount of secondhand photos or long distance information could provide.   One night at dinner my husband, David, who for years had suffered my addiction to things Russian and four-legged, suggested that we go to Moscow instead of mailing 700 page catalogues, many of which never arrived.  The trip would pay for itself.

It was the summer of 1989, and relations between Russian and American journalists were not cordial.  Warily, and with great regard for his position, I approached K.P .. as he had begun to sign himself .. with our idea, and he replied graciously and quickly with a promise to guide us through Moscow's Hippodrome track and a stud farm where the current generation of Count Orlov's trotters lived a life far more luxurious than most city residents.   If the Ministry approved, he added, he would host a day at the races.   Although his English was rough, his cousin Yuri would translate.  Closing his letter was an apology that, for obvious reasons, he could not invite us to his home.  Gifts, however, would be gratefully if somewhat stealthily received.  Jeans for his son, books, dried fruit, yarn for his wife, a treat for his dog, Norris.

We were coming down the home stretch.

MOSCOW:  OCTOBER 4:   Horses are in the air.  It may be because the racing season at Moscow's tracks have thunderingly opened.   The broad avenue leading to town from Sheremetyveo airport is lined with billboards of Soviet horses, their riders and drivers.  On what appears to be individual small farms, heavy draft horses haul wagons through the dusk and drizzle against the concrete skyline of the capital.  A block from Red Square, Manezhe, the old Imperial Riding School, now an exhibition hall, glows, its classical columns crumbling.   Equestrians statues are everywhere.

At the hotel, a grim Intourist agent calls K.P., our official host.  We can't place the call ourselves, but can hear his booming voice on the other side of the desk.  He is delighted, he bellows, that we are in Moscow and will meet us the next morning with his cousin and his wife, Kate, at the Hippodrome.  Avoiding the dark stare of the desk clerk, we go obediently to our room. 

FRIDAY: OCTOBER 5.   The morning is gray and cold.  From our hotel window, Red Square, dotted with ever-present militia, is barely visible.  A light rain begins to fall as a taxi takes us the five miles to Trotters' Alley.  Weighed down with camera equipment and gifts for the Bochkarovs, we wait in the little park that borders the ornate facade of the enormous Hippodrome.  Friezes decorate the main entrance, and in the mist, Pyotr Klodt's famous Dawn Horses prance up from their granite fountain base.  Russians revere Klodt's equestrian work and labored feverishly during the Second World War to protect those that stand at either end of Anitchkov Bridge; even the Bolsheviks left his monument to Emperor Nicholas the First in St. Isaac's Square untouched.

We begin a few early photos of the park until we hear a big, gruff voice calling our names. 
"Welcome to Moscow!"

Marching up the driveway is a poker-straight gentleman bundled into a dark coat and hat and red checkered scarf.  At 70, Bochkarov walks with the stride of an impatient general leaving his wife and cousin far behind.  Yuri is 72.  A worn, plaid cap covers his sandy-gray hair and, like most Russians, his bulk is padded with several layers of clothes.  Kate hangs back, obviously nervous and reluctant to be seen with foreigners.

Introductions are made, Yuri sliding deftly from Russian to Cambridge English.  He perfected it, he says, reading Dickens, Trollope, Austen and Hardy and listening to BBC when he felt it safe.  But Bochkarov, Kostya now, is less interested in linguistics and literature than he is in horses, and we are off past the gatekeeper, who clearly recognizes him, and onto the muddy track.

At nine in the morning, the horses are finishing their workout.  Only half a dozen of the 800 trotters stabled here are still on the track pounding by, sending up clods of soaked earth.  Again and again, Kostya apologizes for the dreary weather.  He seems that he is unable to order up sunshine for us; clearly a man used to authority.   Many drivers are women, and the horses, with their ears laid back, look unhappy at having to work in this sea of mud.

Kostya says of Count Orlov's breed:  "It was Russia's top contender for 200 years, but toward the end of the 19th century it lost its stamina, and the government imported 158 stallions and 220 Standardbred mares from America.  With them came veterinarians, farriers, grooms, and your famous racing trainer and his family, Will Caton.  The Catons lived close to the track under the patronage of Emperor Nikolai Alexandrovich and, later, Count Dashkov, one of the most powerful men in the country."

Bochkarov, born in Ukraine of physician parents, has survived the Revolution, the Civil War that followed it, and two world wars where he served in the officer corps.  For a moment he seems to drift back in time then, grabbing our arms, he bustles off to the barns, easily outpacing Kate and Yuri. 

Orlov trotter at work, 19th century

Before we reach them, the doors fly open and the largest man I have ever seen lumbers toward us.  It's Alexander Rogalev, director of the Hippodrome, nicknamed Ilya Mouramatez after the mammoth Russian folk hero.   With an imperious gesture, Kostya commands that he bring on the horses.  Although he is close to retirement during these Gorbachev years, he is clearly a man of power, and the lumbering but shy Sasha lumbers off.  In a minute the yard facing the barn is filled with workers eager to see the "Americansky journaleest".   A young boy hurries out with a table and chairs which he sets carefully in the mud.  We shake hands and he disappears.

Then the parade begins.  The Orlovs come first.  Kostya has provided us with a list of the horses we will see, and as they appear, imperious as any Romanov, he reads off age, bloodline, track time, and the stud farm from which they come.  The proud grooms, leading their charges, pose patiently in the thin northern light while we fire off our cameras.

First there is Kupol, a strong, fractious gray, a track record holder who clearly resents being led through the slush to pose and thrashes about on the wet asphalt.  He's from the Khrenovoie stud farm, the old Orlov estate, where 3,000 of Russia's best horses are raised.  The Dubrovsky stud, farther to the south, is represented by the dainty filly Gaia, who Kostya tells us in English "is my love", and the Perm stud by Bars, named for the 18th century Orlov foundation sire.

For a moment, Kostya seems to drift back in time.  "Once there were 37 million horses in Russia.  Now we have 3 million.  The wars took a terrible toll.  Horses, such innocent victims!  But the government works hard to rebuild the stock.  Now there are over 100 stud farms in the country, and I've been to them all except the Perm farms in the Urals.   Our riders are well-trained and show in international competition, and we race in Europe, the Middle East, and Scandinavia.  And of course we go to the Olympic Equestrian Games."

Private ownership of horses, in this Gorbachev era, is still difficult because horses, unlike pleasure boats which can be bought, might be used for individual profit.  However, Kostya adds, riding is immensely popular, and he will show us Moscow's newest teaching arena.

Inside, we follow a long corridor, climb a few steps and suddenly look down into a 100 x 300 foot ring. Light floods in through enormous window-walls, mirrors run floor to ceiling, and a series of wide doors lead to the school barn opposite the gallery.

In the ring, a net drop curtain separates beginning and intermediate students, all properly dressed in costly boots, breeches, and sweaters.  The beginners -- slumped back in their saddles, heels up and toes down with a fistful of mane for moral support -- look like their novice counterparts everywhere. 

I'm astonished.  I didn't expect to find riding lessons flourishing here, particularly in such a superb new arena, and I ask Kostya how the students are chosen.

"There's a long waiting list," he admits, settling us at ringside.  "It costs 50 kopecks an hour (roughly 75 cents) but we have only 80 horses and few teachers.  Riding has always been a passion among Russians, but today most of our students come from diplomatic missions."  This is my introduction to the non-answer, an enigma I'll soon learn not to challenge.

The school horses are fat, their coats are glossy.  At the far end of the ring, several are brought out for us to see.  Kate, who speaks no English, nudges her husband and smiles.

"She likes that one," Kostya explains pointing to a golden mare.  "We call her the Moscow palomino.  The school also uses Trakehners because they're versatile, and the great Don horse which gives us a good looking animal that's also tough and levelheaded."

Kalinin Alechankov, the dapper veterinarian, arrives with a handful of magazines from abroad.  He is obviously proud of them and passes them around.  Vet medicine attracts relatively few Russians. Owning animals is not as common as it is in the west, but theory is firm.  "No," he says firmly in answer to my question, "we do not use any drug in our race horses or in any other kind of competition.  If a horse is injured, he is laid up.  Not used."  The idea of administering tranquilizers or stimulants, which is common but denied in western competition, is clearly distateful to this dedicated, suave gentleman.   

Heaving himself up, Sasha suggests a tour of the barns, and we follow him downstairs.  The horses, fetlock-deep in shavings, doze after their workout.  At noon they can look forward to fresh oats or pellets.   For breakfast they are served hot bran mash and hay; for dinner, hay alone.  Truly an aristocrat’s diet.

This is Sasha's domain, and Kostya lets him show us the farriers' corner where all shoes are handmade from bar iron "because each horse is different", the grain room, the tack room where rows of well-worn bits and bridles hang, and the sleeping quarters for the grooms who work rotating night duty.  In the corner is the same carton I have seen in every stable from Honolulu to St. Cloud.  It holds two weeping kittens abandoned by their mother but nurtured by the girls who work around the track.

 Kostya Bokhcharov, the author, and  Yuri Vlianchenko in Moscow

Outside is a turn-out ring and a hot-walker where sweating horses are cooled down.  The sky is lowering.  Leaves from the shedding trees stick to our shoes but, undaunted, Kostya plows on pointing to a lemon-yellow building across the street.

"That's the old Moscow Jockey Club," he says.  "It's empty now and will probably be torn down.  Everyone who was well-connected met there before the revolution much like the Petersburg Yacht Club.  And      

there," he indicates a moldering                                                                                                                 
complex, "is the stable of the former oil magnate Leon Mantashev.  He kept his best horses and riders there and lived in another mansion cross town.  He left just before 1917, and I doubt that his house will stand much longer."

Kostya seems to bring himself back from a sad reverie.  "Now.  What about tomorrow?  Have you got permission to visit the Moscow stud farm?"

We tell him that our letter requesting such a visit wasn't answered.  Snorting something into his muffler, Kostya marches to the phone, dials irritably and snarls at some official underling at the Ministry.  At his torrent of Russian, which is best left untranslated, Yuri smiles and shakes his head.

"Nyet!  Nyet!" Kostya tells the telephone.  Then, "Da.  Da.  Spassibo."
When he nods, Yuri says, "The best horses from the stud have just left for Moscow. Tomorrow they'll be presented at the Exposition.  Kostya will get us guest passes.  Now we'll go and warm up."

Back in Sasha's office, tumblers of vodka are lined up on a table like bowling pins waiting to be knocked down.   Kostya raises his, recites to Yuri, and sits down looking pleased with himself.

"Kostya toasts you with a French proverb," repeats his cousin.   "The most beautiful sights in the world are a dancing woman, a boat under sail, and a running horse."

We all drink to that.

SATURDAY:  October 6:  The Exposition of Achievements of the National Economy is housed on a six hundred acre park northwest of Moscow, and Kostya insists we take the Metro although a car is available.  He knows every foot of the subway and is justifiably proud of its architecture and decor.
For the next hour we dart off one train and onto another until we emerge at the gates to the park.  From there we take a sleek, chauffered minibus past rocket mockups, soccer fields, restaurants and exhibtion halls to the Horse Pavillion.

Kostya ushers us through the lobby where a weekend crowd jostles among displays of saddles, troika harnesses and silver trophies.  He is eager to get to the horses, but the stable area is jammed too.   With annoyance etched on his face, he motions us to a corner while he plunges back into the fray.

Before we realize what has happened or to whom Kostya has barked orders, the center aisle empties out, and we are alone with the horses and their grooms.  Whether the Moscovites resent having to retreat in the face of Kostya's advance we don't know.   It has been accomplished quickly and quietly.  Through the far, sunny end of the barn we watch the advance of a wiry young man with a disarming smile.   It is Yevgeni Sergius Filatov, pavilion director and one of Kostya's closest colleagues.  He is clearly eager to show us his charges and promises to bring a specimen of each breed outside for us to photograph.

We wait under dripping trees while Kostya says, "Each stud farm has sent its top horses to the fair, but later this month it will close down and the horses will go home.  Farm animals will stay, but horses have the winter off."   He points down the lane toward an arena.  "Tomorrow they perform there.  Each breed has its specialty...dressage, jumping, pulling."

Pulling, he adds, is done by the Estonian draft horses, Torrics.  The champion can haul one and a half tons for two kilometers in five minutes without breaking a sweat.

Kate hasn't come with us today.  She is a physician and is working at her clinic.  Without her gentle reminders of his two previous bouts with pneumonia, Kostya flounders about in the puddles, his coat flapping open, his hat left somewhere in the barn.   Yuri nags him dutifully, then gives it up when the first horse appears.

She is Khabra, a dazzling white Orlov, and a perfect example of her breed with a long, arched neck, straight back and sturdy legs.  The Arab influence, which Count Orlov introduced into the breed, is obvious but Kostya says, "We have relatively few pure Arabians now, and those are bred mainly in the south.  In the thirties we imported large numbers from France and also from Lady Wentworth's Crabbet Park stud farm in England.  Still, our emphasis seems to be on other breeds."

I ask if we can see horses that are indigenous to the Soviet Union and, almost before the words leave my mouth , a groom appears leading Sere, a golden-dun gelding, elegant and high-spirited with flashy black points.

"This is an Akhal-Teke," Kostya says with a proprietary air.  "The oldest breed in our country.  They are raised in the Kazakh and Turkmen republics and are used mostly as saddle horses.  Yevgeni Sergius's father won the Grand Prix de Dressage at the Olympics on an Akhal-Teke."

Sere has had his fifteen minutes of fame, and disappears reluctantly through the barn door looking imperiously over his shoulder.

"Now for our prima donna," Kostya announces.

The sound of clattering hoofs reaches us before Fortunata, the darling of the Moscow stud, rounds the corner dragging two frantic grooms on either side.  Three-quarters Orlov and one-quarter Thoroughbred he has trotted the mile in 2.04 4/5ths  and doesn't want anyone to forget it.

Arrogant and demanding, Fortunata will stand only where he wants to, and efforts to lead him to a sunnier spot end in an ill-bred episode of rearing, snorting and eye-rolling.

Kostya and Filatov laugh.  "His father was the notorious Peon," they explain.  "He was not noted for his good behavior either."

Inside the barn, each groom is eager to show off his horse.  One young man, with only five teeth in his mouth and those gold, has his Arab stud kneel, bow and offer a hoof in greeting.  Another, with a horse from the frigid regions of Viatka, exchanges kisses with his prodigy, and a third allows us into the stall to see an Orlov mare with her foal, a skinny-legged youngster who has trouble keeping his hind end in line with his front.   Other handlers press picturers, pamphlets and souvenir pins on us and ask for chewing gum in return.  They are a generous, proud, outgoing lot whose patience with their high-strung, state-owned property is endless.  They are paid about one hundred roubles a month, or $150.

SUNDAY: October 7:  This is our last day in Moscow.  We leave the next morning.

But it's going to be a good one.  At the track we will celebrate Harvest Day, the traditional end of crop gathering and the beginning of the winter season.  Kostya has, again, given us special passes as well as a program listing horses, drivers, and intra-race events.  This is extraordinary, for few fans arrive at the track with these vital statistics.

When we reach the Hippodrome, the parking lot -- empty last Friday -- is packed with Volga and Moskvitch sedans.  There is no discernible order here; the cars look as if they were dropped from the sky and left where they landed.  Race fans bundled up against the cold elbow toward the main gate fishing for their 50 kopek grandstand admission.  Better seats sell for a rouble.

Kostya, Kate and Yuri steer us quickly away from the grandstand crowd and into a reserved section separated from the groundlings by a maroon velvet rope.   These comfortable boxes are located on the finish line and directly beneath the Czar's Box one tier above us.  It's obvious that Kostya is recognized instantly, but our presence draws open, questioning stares and whispers behind gloved hands.

Orlovs in the Hippodrome

The stands are filled, but still fans pour in crowding up against the fence attempting to sneak onto the infield.   Militia turn them back none too gently.  Inside, the cafe is busy and lines have formed at the betting windows.  Bettors can risk one, five or ten roubles, and the daily double is any two consecutive races.  The track profit is divided among the government, the stud farms, and the drivers, and judging from the size of the crowd, the income must be considerable.

The infield is soggy after several days of rain, but the track has been raked and harrowed until it's almost dry.  Kostya says the running times should be good, and the trotters will continue until the weather makes sulky racing impossible.   Then troika and ice racing will complete the winter season.
"First," he instructs, "there is a parade of all participants, and between each race a contest or exhibition from other republics.  At tracks all over Russia we celebrate Harvest Day."

Russian performers and audiences are extremely prompt, and at 1 o'clock the parade begins.  At a stately walk, riders pass the reviewing stand and salute the flag of the USSR as the national anthem blares from half a dozen speakers.  Kostya ceremoniously tips his fedora.  The colors flow by, dazzling and set off against the drab Moscow skyline:  red hunt coats, white breeches, black top hats, pastel tights, and silver fencing masks on the jousters, jockeys in green silks.

The crowd is polite but, like racegoers everywhere, impatient for the first race to get underway.  In a moment a Volga starter car appears on the track with the moveable gate mounted on the rear.  The horses begin their warm-up.  It is a field of seven evenly matched Orlovs.

Kostya says firmly that it's impolite for us to bet.  We are his guests, he is the expert, and any money we won would be resented.  But the stunning black gelding he points out  wins handily although the time is not good.  The cold has begun to creep into the stands, our feet are going numb.  Instinctively, our host notices.  At our suggestion that we visit the steamy cafe, he says simply, "No" and steers us in the opposite direction.

Behind the box seats is a small, handsomely furnished room.  On the paneled walls hang photos of past Hippodrome winners, and in the corner stands an enormous color TV set, an unheard of luxury in present-day Moscow.  A waiter in dark tie and starched shirt prepares blini filled with red and black caviar for the few well-dressed guests while a bartender pours large glasses of Armenian brandy and triple-distilled vodka.

Kostya keeps our plates filled and introduces us to one affable visitor after another:  the senior director or the track, two newly-blonde women administrators, and old friends from the Ministry who greet him affectionately, pumping his hand up and down.  He seems to sense the afternoon is slipping away and wants to heap all his riches upon us.

We surrender and let him bustle us in and out for the rest of the day.  He insists we watch the third race because Al't, one of the horses we met on Friday and a great favorite,  is bound to win.   Al't obliges by several lengths, and when he trots up to receive his trophy the crowd claps and chants his name.  Kostya awards the silver cup and bows graciously to the stands.

Between races an eight-man jousting team mounted on tough, wiry horses lunge at each other with epees, trying to puncture balloons tied to their rivals' heads.  It is over quickly.  The last is dispatched with murderous efficiency.   They are followed by stadium jumping, the closest event to western show competition and not popular in current Russia.  "Possibly," he adds, "because it carries with it an elitist past."  

How ironic, we think, given the great divide between the old-world room of caviar and brandy we have just visited and the cafeteria where Muscovites bundled into their worn coats jostled for soup and tea.

We ask him delicately if he has seen the current issue of Krokodil , the satire magazine which enjoys both popularity and a certain degree of autonomy.  In it three cartoons parody the recent and presumably effete interest in horses.  The largest depicts the famous statue of Peter the Great on his rearing stallion ... headed for a small, neatly painted jump-fence.  Kostya laughs amiably but shakes his head noncommittally.  He would have made a brilliant politician.

By 3 o'clock the sun has sunk behind the west wall, and no amount of footstamping or brandy-nipping wards off the cold, which seems to affect us more than it does the Muscovites who are still absorbed in picking the next winner.  The track is in shadows, and dampness seeps up from the cement underfoot.  But none of us will admit that our time together is almost over.

We watch another race, an intense grueling trot in which the horse is ridden rather than driven and cannot break its gait, and then the game that follows, "Catch the Girl".  The chilled fans cheer as Kazakh ladies gallop down the track to escape their Cossack pursuers.   The point is to catch the ladies and kiss them while riding at full tilt.  Those who are kissed have the pleasure of chasing their man back home, whip in hand, yellow robes streaming behind.

Soon even the windows of the skyscrapers that ring the Hippodrome lose their last streak of reflected sunlight, and we begin to gather our things.  Kostya lives not far from the track; Yuri lives alone in a one-room apartment.  There is no need for either to explain that they cannot, given current political circumstance, invite us  home, but we will walk together to the taxi stand.

We cross the little park where Klodt's horses still play in icy waters, then head for the line of cabs across the street.  Yuri stands with his hands in his pockets, looking at the ground.  In a whisper, he, who has been victim to  northern exile, asks, "Can you do anything to get me out of here?"  We promise to try and thank him for being so patient with us, but he shakes his head.  Quickly Kate hugs us both and Kostya holds us with his strong arms.

"Write to us.  Please," he says.

I can say nothing and slide into the cab.  It pulls away, and out of the rear window I see Yuri hurrying off alone and Kate and Kostya striding toward their home, their faces set.  From the track comes the sound of cheering.   The last race is over.

c. Gretchen Haskin, 2007

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