No country for dead sharks

Eeks - the week has got away from me.  Runners Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday; and on Friday I made a rare excursion to a race-meeting (York) at which I didn't have a runner.  A lunch invitation on one of the days of the Ebor Meeting was too great a gift horse to look in the mouth (and I write that as some who was lucky enough to receive an invitation to lunch on the final day of Royal Ascot this year but stayed at home to work a full morning and afternoon stables and to watch the races on TV when I could instead) which was great - but it meant that Tuesday (Brighton, Roy), Wednesday (Bath, Hope Is High), Thursday (Leicester evening racing, Konigin) and Friday (York) all saw me away from home - so I'm now exhausted, under pressure, and blog-less.

Brighton was a bit disappointing.  Roy's run at Windsor had suggested that he'd be competitive when he went back to Brighton, but he wasn't.  But, in fairness, the race at Windsor had been probably unique in being a middle-distance race at Windsor in the 21st century run at a fierce tempo; whereas at Brighton the race was run more sedately than is often the case there.  Bath was great, though: Hope had run well to be fifth first up at Sandown and stepped up from that to finish third, beaten half a length and a head behind the odds-on favourite.

Leicester was a blow, though.  Konigin does have a mind of her own, but she had done everything right when third at Yarmouth third up.  She had done everything right at home since then, and did everything right in the preliminaries on Thursday.  Once she got down to the start, however, it was a very different story.  She very nearly didn't go into the stalls, and when she came out she never picked up her bridle.  She finished fifth of eight, but that flattered her: she was a well-beaten fifth who never looked like taking a hand in the finish at any stage of the race. And then, to rub salt into the wounds, the A14 was shut in two places on the way home.  Leicester is 80 miles away.  It took 160 minutes to come home.  Average of 30 mph when it's dual-carriageways all the way.  Ran at 7.00.  Left at 8.00.   Home at 10.40.  Back in the house just after midnight.  Ugghh!

But, as ever, we pick ourselves up and move on.  In particular we move on to tomorrow, when The Simple Truth (ie two-year-old gelding by Rajsaman ex Minnie's Mystery) makes his debut in the first race at Goodwood.  I'd guess that, by making his debut in August, he'll find himself the earliest two-year-old runner I've had this century.  I generally find that our debutants fare less well than I'm expecting (ie hoping) and I'd imagine that it will be more of the same tomorrow.  And he's sure to be the complete outsider.  But I hope that we'll find some encouragement in the debut.  And after that we'll head to Bath on Tuesday.  We're like sharks (and, according to Woody Allen, relationships): we have to keep moving.  We don't want a dead shark on our hands.