The office of Musabah Al Muhairi resembles Aladdin’s cave: polished gold trophies, shimmering glass vases, framed photographs and an occasional Omani-style khanjar.
In the far corner, mounted upon an amethyst plinth, sits a magnificent, crystalline horse’s head.
Beside it lies the empty box that once housed an Emir’s sword. The room is a treasure trove of success.
Al Muhairi, a 54-year-old Emirati trainer, runs the Oasis Stables at Meydan Racecourse. In 2010/11, he averaged one winner from every six of his horses that ran.
Last year, he experienced his best season yet, claiming 33 winners. He remains the only trainer to win Jebel Ali Racecourse's "big three" contests in successive years and has 14 Dubai World Cup Carnival victories.
Nowadays, he has between 50 and 60 staff working under him, including around 30 stablehands, 16 riders and a collection of other aids and assistants.
It is a far cry from the manner in which his relationship with horses began in the mid-1970s, when he raced them sans-saddle on the beaches of Ajman against his friend – and future brother-in-law – Ali Rashid Al Raihe.
“I started racing horses in 1975 for fun,” he said from inside the triumph-cluttered office opposite the stables.
Wearing a dark green fleece and black baseball cap, he looks unassuming as he pulls out a smartphone and proceeds to show sepia-tinged photos from 1978 of him atop an Arabian thoroughbred. His first horse was called Shegran, the Arabic word for chestnut.
“Once I started, I couldn’t stop,” he said. “I rode together with Ali, and we would always try to make a competition. I would say my horse is strong and he would say the same, so we would set a date 20 days in advance and agree to race.
“That is really when I started training, as my friends would then come to me and ask me to train their horses for races.”
Al Muhairi stopped riding in 1979, but the amicable rivalry with his friend remains to this day.
Al Raihe, whose wife is the older sister of Al Muhairi’s wife, owns the stables next door, and the two men also often visit each other at their homes in Ajman. These may be family occasions, but the subject never veers too far from racing and horses and, naturally, who will win the next meet.
“We started at the same time,” Al Muhairi said. “He came into my family 35 years ago, and from that time we have been like brothers, all the time together.
“Every time we speak, it’s about nothing except horses and racing.
“Of course, he wants to win and I want to win, but if he wins I’m happy, and if I win he’s happy.
“Sometimes I tell him: ‘My horse will win this’. I tell him: ‘Nobody can beat this horse’. He doesn’t always believe me, but I know. He argues that his horse is better, but I know otherwise. After the race, of course, I tell him, ‘I told you so’.”
A few years ago, so evenly matched were the pair throughout the 2010/11 season that Al Raihe won the UAE Trainers’ championship by virtue of better second-place finishes after the two men finished the year locked on 30 winners each.
“See, I would have been very happy if I had won the championship, but when he won and I came second, I just looked at how many runners he had and when I see that I felt like I won,” Al Muhairi said with a smile.
“Ali had around 100 more than me, and yet I still won 30 races.
“My results were better.”
Out in the stables, it is clear to see why Al Muhairi’s horses are so successful. The nearby Meydan Hotel has provided a place of rest and recuperation for some of Europe’s most prestigious football teams in recent years, yet not even the world’s best players are pampered quite like the equine protagonists preparing for the Dubai World Cup on Saturday.
Recent promotional material for the US$27.5 million (Dh101m) meet describe the horses as the “real celebrities”.
The beautiful beasts, with names such as Russian Rock, Hazaz and Discoverer, are awoken from their stable slumber with breakfast in bed.
After a bucket of Australian oats and grains, they are taken out and showered and sometimes gifted new shoes.
Occasionally, somebody will brush their teeth for them.
They have access to a private treadmill and some of the finest training facilities on the planet.
Maria Ritchie, a former rider, has lived in the UAE for 13 years and has worked with Al Muhairi and his horses for the past decade.
Originally from New Zealand, the assistant trainer appreciates the difference between the conditions here and those found back home on the South Island.
“It’s unnatural for them to be locked up in the air-conditioned stables,” said Ritchie, who wakes up every morning at 2.30am to be at work in time for the riders arriving at 4am. “I wouldn’t like to be a horse out here, but they are very well looked after.”
Stood amid the sprawling grounds, it is easy to forget Dubai’s financial nucleus is within a 10-minute drive.
The surroundings, with wild grass, green trees and that quintessential farm-like smell of mud and manure, produce a rural, countryside feel. The only giveaway of its proximity to the heart of the city being the top of Burj Khalifa peeking out from above the stable roofs.
Grooms, predominantly of subcontinental origin, wear green and yellow polo shirts with faces of focus as they go about their jobs. Mark Monkhouse, who helps run stable tours at Meydan, is showing a group of 10 or so fascinated tourists the horses’ treadmill equipment when a smiling Al Muhairi walks past.
A European gentleman, having been briefly introduced to the renowned trainer, jokes that “we all understand that smile”.
Al Muhairi pocketed Dh3.5m prize money in 2013 alone.
“Every year, we think we will do better than the previous year, so our target this season is simply to try to win more races than last,” Al Muhairi said.
He achieved that goal earlier this week when he claimed his 34th winner of the season to eclipse last year’s haul.
He lies second in the championship, though, and is not content.
“Next year will be better,” he promised. “We have new horses that still are not ready, but they will be by next year.”
Such is the lack of space in Aladdin’s cave that some of Al Muhairi’s newly acquired awards simply remain in his car, being shuttled back and forth between Ajman and the Oasis Stables.
“I have many trophies back at home, too, but my wife has started to put some of them into storage,” he said. “But I don’t mind.
“You can never have too many.”
gmeenaghan@thenational.ae
Follow us on twitter at @SprtNationalUAE
