Saturday, March 24, 2007

Aintree, Nad Al Sheba, Epsom and Towcester

We're slowly working our way back to spring, take two. We haven't had a repetition of the snowy scene depicted on my previous blog entry (Wednesday), although we did have a further snow fall the following day. It's still cold and grey, and a few snow flakes this afternoon wouldn't be a complete surprise, but if they do fall they won't last. And they won't fall on me, unless they come towards the end of the afternoon, because earlier on I'll be stretched out - with either a dog, a cat, or both - in front of the tv watching a cracking Winter Derby Day at Lingfield. I'll also have to make sure to catch the handicap hurdle at Navan on ATR, as Irish National winner Point Barrow completes his Grand National preparation. He's become our sentimental hope for the race, as his trainer Pat Hughes' nephew Philip was here again this morning (and rode Jack Dawson and Brief Goodbye) again with Andrew McCarthy. As regards the Grand National, I'd been a huge Nil Desperandum fan, with Little Brick the secondary selection, so was greatly saddened at the fatal accidents to those horses at Uttoxeter and Cheltenham last week. Racing, particularly jumps racing, can be a very cruel sport.

Next Saturday will be even better than today, with possibly the best line-up ever for Dubai World Cup night. Perhaps not the greatest World Cup ever - Cigar v. Soul Of The Matter could hold that title, or perhaps Dubai Millenium's stroll in the park - but certainly one of the very best as Invasor faces some very good pretenders to his title of the world's best; and the supporting races have attracted a great spread of top horses from around the world. I certainly hope I enjoy the day more than the equivalent day last year, when we had the heart-break of seeing Benedict suffer a fatal injury in the Lincoln at what seemed a truly God-forsaken Redcar. Even without that terrible experience, the sight of the pathetic line-up for the Brocklesby would have made a trip to Redcar a depressing experience that day, so I'm already steeling myself for the depressing fact of racing life which the early two-year-old races are. It isn't so bad overseas, where the early juvenile races are valuable and prestigious contests in which trainers run good horses, but here it is just the country's most ruthless trainers running the ones they consider the most expendable. Last year's Brocklesby contained arguably the weediest collection of horses ever assembled for a race, but it did give us the first clue that Invincible Spirit was on his way to sire-stardom as it produced his first winner, albeit by default with a very poor horse. It also provided us with the first clue that the lovely Act One might be going to prove himself to be a very disappointing stallion: I may be writing him off prematurely, but it is currently very hard to enthuse about his stud career. His Brocklesby runner - a pathetic creature who looked as if he wasn't even ready to be weaned, and who would surely then have been still at least twelve months away from his debut if anyone other than David Evans had been his trainer - caught my eye solely because of his lack of appeal, and about the only one other Act One horse I've noticed since then was a Mark Johnston-trained, Sheikh Mohammed-owned debutante in a four-runner twelve furlong 3-year-old maiden at Lingfield yesterday. She was forecast to be a 7/2 shot in the Racing Post, but her SP was 20/1. Unsurprisingly she finished fourth (behind a beautiful Galileo Derby entrant called Wandle and a pair of In The Wingses), but she actually far ran better than her market drift and last place suggest - so perhaps there might be a glimmer of light at the end of Act One's tunnel after all. I certainly hope so, because one always likes to see talented Classic stayers become good stallions. On the subject of Mark Johnston and Sheikh Mohammed, incidentally, I see that Niall Hannity was listed as the purchaser of the horse I admired so much at Doncaster on Wednesday, Rain And Shade, so I presume that Ferdy Murphy will be his trainer. He is definitely a horse to remember.

One nice result in the week came a couple of days ago when a horse who has been mentioned in a previous posting, Shaftesbury Avenue, won a six furlong maiden at Southwell on his third outing. He'd run down the track on his debut, when his name had caught my eye, but then ran much better second time out to be second. And this week he won impressively under Darryll Holland. I saw this race on At The Races, and it was my first sighting of the horse, and was tickled to see that he actually does look very like his great Australian namesake. It's still hard to believe he might be as good as the original Shaftesbury Avenue, but he's certainly a very nice horse and I'll be wishing him well as his career develops. It's good to see his trainer Jimmy O'Reilly with a decent horse, and one has to salute him for buying this son of Fusaichi Pegasus as an unraced three-year-old out of Ballydoyle last autumn for only 3,500 gns. The bargains are there - one just has to find them.

Another horse I'll be wishing well will be Authorized, the Peter Chapple-Hyam-trained Racing Post Trophy winner. We caught sight of him this morning walking back from, I presume, a gallop Across The Flat, ridden by the lad who looks after him, Noel O'Connor, and he looked a million dollars. He's a magnficent horse who looks to have done really well over the winter, and will be a worthy opponent for Teofilo in the Derby. The Heath is an exciting place at this time of year as one sees the signs of the oncoming season. The old stalwart The Whistling Teal has come out of winter quarters and we've been seeing him most mornings in his usual routine of wandering around seemingly aimlessly on his own under his lad Gary Corney. When we passed Mark Tompkins' string the other morning he had both Darryll Holland and Jimmy Quinn riding out, which is a sure sign of the approach of the season. Mark must have pulled a few strings to get them both to ride out from the yard, rather than just meet him up on the Heath, so I'd say that he's got a few horses that he thinks might be ready to run well. And as for our armoury - roll on Towcester!

4 comments:

Fiddling The Facts said...

Surprised it took you this long to guess it, John.

Fiddling The Facts said...

As an Aintree veteran myself, I'm going all out for the bold mare Liberthine and Mr S Waley-Cohen to be the first amateur to win the Grand National since Marcus Armytage. The Daily Telegraph has already signed up SWC as a guest columnist so they clearly think he'll be following in Marcus's footsteps. Hands up who can tell me what Mr Frisk did after he retired from racing...

gladness said...

Mmm ... The Grand National. I'll have to mull that one over a while longer yet. The last time I looked at the betting lists, many of the shorter-priced names were horses who looked merely possible, rather than probable, runners. Or even downright unlikely runners. A closer inspection of the weights in the next few days might bring some inspiration. Joe's Edge certainly sounds a very feasible contender.

As regards The Classics, don't worry. Firebrand will still pull a Holy Roman Replacement out of the fire. Mount Nelson is a colt of huge potential. And one underestimates PC-H Classic contenders at one's peril.

Looking farther ahead, Dance Hero v. Miss Andretti at Royal Ascot is something to savour, if such a clash were to eventuate.

And Mr Frisk ... Mmm (again) ... I'll hazard a guess that Tracey Bailey continued to ride him after he'd finished racing, and took him either eventing or team-chasing. I'd suspect more likely the former.

HSH The Archduke of Pinza said...

From the amount of loose horses I have seen from Mr. Tompkins string recently I would positively encourage, no beg, jockeys to ride from the yard! They may have red jackets but Firebrand they are not!!!