Think about horse racing and it's likely that Ascot or the Meydan spring to mind well before Sudan. Unexpectedly, however, the combination of excellent horse stock from Darfur and decades as a British colony have collided to give Sudan, and Khartoum in particular, a fine equestrian heritage.
Khartoum Horse Club is in the south of the city. From the looks of it, when it was built it would have been on the outskirts of town, but now it is surrounded by apartment blocks, a photogenic mosque, and low-rise homes, shops and animal sheds. Once lush turf has turned to a few dusty tufts of grass amongst the sand, and the grandstand has long fallen into disrepair, but regular races still draw a significant crowd, egging on their favourites.
We headed over to the club for a mid-afternoon meeting only to find the staff in the final stages of preparation for Army and Navy day races. Red plastic chairs were laid out across the grandstand, the stairs were brushed of sand, and the track was dampened to reduce the clouds of dust. We were invited to join the VIPs in the box at the centre of the grandstand, from where we had an excellent view of proceedings
