Naughty Roy

Yesterday's outing to Nottingham was straightforward enough.  I was probably less of the over-excited proud father on Roy's second trip to the races than on his first, and that was no bad thing really as there wasn't a great deal to be excited about.  And, in one respect, nothing to be proud of.  The problem was that Roy rather blotted his copy-book in the stalls.

It's not uncommon for horses to be very good in the stalls (and at the races in general) first time out and then to let themselves down second time, simply because on the second occasion they realise the daunting prospect that they're there to work hard, whereas on the first occasion it only became plain late in the piece that it's an outing of bloody hard work, rather than just a walk in the park.  So it wasn't a huge surprise when Roy played up in the stalls, although it was still disappointing.  Fortunately a stalls handler climbed in there with him and righted the ship, so no harm was done, but it was enough to earn him/me a warning, so that a repeat would see him down for a stalls test.

Having messed around in the stalls, he unsurprisingly jumped slowly, missing the start by around four lengths.  And, disappointingly, he'd only passed one of his rivals by the time that he reached the post.  It had looked a couple of furlongs out as if he'd have passed more because Hannah had sensibly only asked him to make up the lost ground gradually, and he was still going OK while three or four in front of him were really struggling badly.

But it turned out that he was only able to overtake one of them (who ended up being beaten sixteen lengths by Roy, never mind the God-knows-how-many lengths he was off the winner) and still couldn't catch the Tim Easterby-trained 100/1 shot whom you can see being eased down in front of him as the finishing line looms.  Ah well, it wasn't a particularly promising run by any standards, but he'll be a nice horse in time - have no fear!  Other than that, the main story remains the weather.

We've had some 'freak weather conditions' in that it didn't rain yesterday and didn't rain today either, which isn't something one has been able to say often in recent weeks (or months).  And as you can see from these photographs taken today (including of the lovely red tree in our neighbour's garden), we actually had a couple of hours (no more than that, I'm afraid) of really splendid conditions which allowed the acceptable face of autumn to be seen.

We've got Many Levels in at Doncaster on Saturday and it's looking as if the ground there will be closer to good than to heavy, which is a surprise.  And then I'm hopeful that conditions might be suitable for Ethics Girl to have a run.  She's in at Market Rasen on Sunday (where the ground is currently good to soft) and Southwell on Monday (where the ground is, incredibly, currently listed as good) so Monday's option might be the one preferred.  We'll keep an open mind, but fingers crossed she'll be going somewhere, which will be great as she's more than ready for a run.