More hope and more travels

We had a pleasant if frustrating trip to Thirsk yesterday.  Zarosa (pictured before the race)
duly ran very well to be beaten two and a bit lengths, but unfortunately these two and a bit lengths came in four segments (head, neck, one-and-three-quarter-lengths, short head) so that meant that she finished fifth, so had nothing to show for her efforts.  She ran well and bravely, but got too far back early on in what turned out to be a slowly-run race, and the task of sprinting up the straight well enough to reel in the leaders was just beyond her.

Still, she only finished a short head behind the horse which I and most other people thought was most likely to win, so I dare say that that horse's connections were more disappointed by their creditable fourth place than we were by our creditable fifth.  We got off lightly with the traffic yesterday too, and the driving, like the day, was fairly pleasant.  There was a lot of disruption on the roads, but we more or less avoided it, even if doing so did involve taking an unprescribed diversion off the A1 on both the outward and the return journeys.  But we didn't do too badly: home around quarter past midnight after the 7.50 race at a course about 185 miles from home.

Let's hope that we find things straightforward too (and let's hope that the races go more to plan) tomorrow when we head for a track another 100 miles or so farther away: Carlisle, where Ethics Girl (pictured in the second paragraph after exercise today) contests the very competitive Carlisle Bell (whose relatively huge prize attracted 47 declarations, of whom the lowest-weighted 30 were eliminated) and Gift Of Silence runs in the next race, a decent fillies' and mares' handicap.  As ever, we'll be travelling in hope: hoping for plenty, but expecting nothing.  The weather should be nice anyway: as you can see from this view of three of Toby Coles' horses (with Toby at the back) at the bottom of Long Hill this morning, fine weather seems to have returned, which will be lovely for enjoying the Cumbrian and Pennine scenery along the way.