THE MAYNORA STORY
It all started with a trip to Malton, North Yorkshire, on a beautiful summer’s morning — bright, early, and full of anticipation. We jumped in the car and made our way to Craig Lidster’s racing yard, Beverley House Stables. At that stage of the channel, we’d only filmed content at one yard before and were still finding our feet, but excited nonetheless.
On arrival, it quickly became clear this was a tight-knit operation. Meeting Craig himself, along with Dan, Millie and Matty, we felt immediately welcome — the banter started flowing straight away and there was a warm feel to the yard. Little did we know then that this would be the first of many visits, as well as the beginning of a genuine friendship and professional relationship.
As neither of us have come from racing backgrounds ourselves, we’ve always felt an urge to learn about the sport and recognise the plethora of information and insight that racing fans don’t always have access to. Particularly when visiting a yard, you are constantly learning and listening to the professionals. Ranging from how a horse exercises, the different gallops used, the nuances of yard routines and what it takes to get a horse racecourse ready — these are things we love, and things we wanted to bring to the Paddock Preview viewers through our content.
The market town of Malton, situated in North Yorkshire, is home to a large number of quality racing yards and is a fantastic place to train horses. Nowhere says this more than on the Langton Wold Gallops, with Andy ‘Benno’ Bennison and his team maintaining some super shared training facilities. We first experienced this bumping into Brian Ellison on the Langton Wold, discussing his horse onesmoothoperator about his upcoming Melbourne cup bid in Australia — before enjoying a proper Yorkshire Tea back at Craig’s yard.
Fast forward six months and we’d created a huge amount of content alongside the Lidster yard — from gallops, to behind-the-scenes on racedays, to interviews and more. As New Year’s Day hit we wanted to continue this relationship further, something even bigger and different to what we’d worked on already: a one-year journey sponsoring a horse - Maynora! Part of the Craig Lidster Racing Syndicate and currently being campaigned throughout the all-weather season, we knew this would be a brilliant adventure to start 2026.
Our first raceday as sponsors came at Southwell on January 1st. Attending not just as content creators, but as sponsors, was a surreal experience. Watching jockey PJ MacDonald walk out with our logo on the front of the blue and white silks as he entered the parade ring was a very special moment.
Maynora finished 5th, with the winner being a well-handicapped Juddmonte horse. There were plenty of positives to take from the run, and we were excited to see where he’d go next.
That next run came on Monday night at Dunstall Park. Jimma made the trip from Bournemouth — an opportunity we couldn’t miss — to potentially see Maynora win live in the flesh. He ran a much better race, making the running and just fading late. The result? A 4th-place finish, but crucially, it dropped him to a workable mark.
That opened the door to a quick turnaround — an entry on the Thursday of the same week at Newcastle.
This time, Matty took over race-day duties, heading straight from work for the two-hour drive to the North East. On a stiff track that suited Maynora far better, he ran his best race to date. Him and his stablemate, Surgeon Commander, surged clear of the rest of the field. After a great battle, Maynora was just pipped on the line but hitting the line strongly - which was exciting to see! A very strong run — and one that leaves us genuinely excited about what’s to come.
This is just the beginning. We’ll be sharing the full journey — the ups, the downs, and everything in between — as we sponsor Maynora throughout the year.
Stay tuned, and thank you for being part of the ride.
