The refitting of a visor on Heir To Be had the desired effect as the Andy Haynestrained ten-year-old, ridden by Dominic Elsworth, ran out the game winner of the 3m2f handicap hurdle at the expense of Patrixbourne.

He wanted to walk the full length of the wall and in the process raise as much money as possible for BIBIC, the British Institute for Brain Injured Children and his school, Bridge and Patrixbourne, in Canterbury.

Also, Bann's heavily-theoretical attention to minutiae often detracts from these intriguing details, as when he discusses the ideological import of orthographical changes to the Bargrave name, and the etymology of the family's country home ("Bifrons"), or his labored reading of the inscription on a family monument that the younger Bargrave placed in the parish church of Patrixbourne.