My Dream of Owning a Racehorse!!!
Since the age of 6 I've wanted to own a racehorse. I can proudly say 'I was there' to see the incredible Paul Nicholls trained 'Big Bucks' beat French Opera at Newbury Racecourse this day. If you haven't already guessed..I am mad about horseracing. My aim is to go to every racecourse in England and on the way, make William Hill & Paddy Power fear me with my crazy bets!
The accumulated doubles & trebles bet, a cheeky Lucky 15 (my grandad's favourite - the one who got me into all of this!) or my favourite, the roll over double that has looked a dangerous bet in the past and will definitely come out to play with The Cheltenham Festival just around the corner!
The accumulated doubles & trebles bet, a cheeky Lucky 15 (my grandad's favourite - the one who got me into all of this!) or my favourite, the roll over double that has looked a dangerous bet in the past and will definitely come out to play with The Cheltenham Festival just around the corner!
Tyler's story
I had trained with Roger Morgan of David Beckham fame from the ages of 6 to 8, and had been scouted by West Ham Football Academy, signing for them as soon as I turned 8 years old, playing football three times a week up until I was 14. It wasn't all that long after signing that I started saxophone lessons as something completely different to playing so much football. In that first year of summer holidays I found a book with a playalong CD. I worked through it by myself and went from grade 2 to grade 5 surprising everyone by the time I went back to school. So I was chosen to take part in a lot of concerts after that.
I joined East Barnet Schools Music Band and won the school's prize in both terms I was there, with our conductor, Andrew Pearce, composing a piece for our band with my sax as lead part. In football I won the Barnet area's Manchester United Soccer Skills Competition, and became selected by my schools, and later my District and my County teams playing for them as well as West Ham. With my primary school team we won the largest primary school cup around, The Dick Bailey Cup and with my secondary school team we achieved every young footballer's dream, winning the English Schoolboys' FA Cup in 2007 from over 900 teams that enter nationwide . We also won the County Cup for every single year of secondary school together, years 7 to 11 !
When I was 10 my school music teacher recommended that I audition for Junior Guildhall, the junior department of a world renowned music conservatory, I was successful so attended on Saturdays. I hadn't realised that lessons would run from 8.40am to 4pm until I received my timetable and it meant I would miss all the Saturday horse racing and betting with my granddad. So instead I filled my breaktimes with a newspaper studying the form and a William Hill telephone account. At the same time my music schedule was steadily increasing I'd go to Chadwell Heath training ground straight from school, come home by around 8.30pm, completely red faced and puffed out from kicking around and then start practising my sax. In fact my saxophone teacher, Christian Forshaw, could tell in my breathing whenever I'd been out injured from football for more than a week! I always knew that one day I would have to chose between football and music. Saturday training for the upper age groups at West Ham Academy had become increasingly important for Sunday's games but so had my music commitments and concerts. Junior Guildhall were fantastic and rearranged my Saturday timetable for me, so that I could go to Chadwell Heath on Saturday mornings and the Barbican in the afternoon, with lunch in the car on the way!
Then in the summer of 2007 I entered my first music competition, which was broadcast on BBC2, Classical Star. I had to research and learn a lot of pieces within the three weeks before the competition started because I had never done anything like it before. There were a lot of challenges like improvising, busking, tango dancing and composing film music while in the competition and I was thrilled to get through to the final five musicians. Football? Music? - I just never dreamt of making that choice in such a spectacular way! So, when Universal Classics and Jazz called me up, it was completely amazing to sign my record deal with Dickon Stainer on the pitch at West Ham, Upton Park!
I had trained with Roger Morgan of David Beckham fame from the ages of 6 to 8, and had been scouted by West Ham Football Academy, signing for them as soon as I turned 8 years old, playing football three times a week up until I was 14. It wasn't all that long after signing that I started saxophone lessons as something completely different to playing so much football. In that first year of summer holidays I found a book with a playalong CD. I worked through it by myself and went from grade 2 to grade 5 surprising everyone by the time I went back to school. So I was chosen to take part in a lot of concerts after that.
I joined East Barnet Schools Music Band and won the school's prize in both terms I was there, with our conductor, Andrew Pearce, composing a piece for our band with my sax as lead part. In football I won the Barnet area's Manchester United Soccer Skills Competition, and became selected by my schools, and later my District and my County teams playing for them as well as West Ham. With my primary school team we won the largest primary school cup around, The Dick Bailey Cup and with my secondary school team we achieved every young footballer's dream, winning the English Schoolboys' FA Cup in 2007 from over 900 teams that enter nationwide . We also won the County Cup for every single year of secondary school together, years 7 to 11 !
When I was 10 my school music teacher recommended that I audition for Junior Guildhall, the junior department of a world renowned music conservatory, I was successful so attended on Saturdays. I hadn't realised that lessons would run from 8.40am to 4pm until I received my timetable and it meant I would miss all the Saturday horse racing and betting with my granddad. So instead I filled my breaktimes with a newspaper studying the form and a William Hill telephone account. At the same time my music schedule was steadily increasing I'd go to Chadwell Heath training ground straight from school, come home by around 8.30pm, completely red faced and puffed out from kicking around and then start practising my sax. In fact my saxophone teacher, Christian Forshaw, could tell in my breathing whenever I'd been out injured from football for more than a week! I always knew that one day I would have to chose between football and music. Saturday training for the upper age groups at West Ham Academy had become increasingly important for Sunday's games but so had my music commitments and concerts. Junior Guildhall were fantastic and rearranged my Saturday timetable for me, so that I could go to Chadwell Heath on Saturday mornings and the Barbican in the afternoon, with lunch in the car on the way!
Then in the summer of 2007 I entered my first music competition, which was broadcast on BBC2, Classical Star. I had to research and learn a lot of pieces within the three weeks before the competition started because I had never done anything like it before. There were a lot of challenges like improvising, busking, tango dancing and composing film music while in the competition and I was thrilled to get through to the final five musicians. Football? Music? - I just never dreamt of making that choice in such a spectacular way! So, when Universal Classics and Jazz called me up, it was completely amazing to sign my record deal with Dickon Stainer on the pitch at West Ham, Upton Park!
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Photo taken by Paul Edwards, The Sun
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