Fancy four: Vintage Clouds: Had an excellent spin around Cheltenham. Soldier of Love: Looked like a decent prospect in the Autumn. Highland Hunter: I think it will stay. Oldgrangewood: Has a bit of class and might stay if it gets into a decent rhythm.
Wow, that's a tough race to be taking on! To be run on Sunday of course, due to the funeral. Of the 31 five day declarations, 13 are within 4 lbs of the top rated on Timeform and no less than 21 of the 31 decs are within 3 lbs of Racing Post Ratings top-rated. With the defections of Galvin and Escaria Ten the race looks absolutely wide open to me, so I'll give that one a swerve. Newbury is a bonny-looking card today, packed with potentially good horses. I like King's Lynn (1.40), Amighwar (2.15), Mithras (2.50), Latest Generation (3.25 and Sea Karats (4.35). Latest Generation is particularly intriguing from a betting point of view. Although others in the race are respected, I expect it to mainly concern Maximal and Latest Generation. Maximal finished a neck in front of Latest Generation on it's second run, but the latter was making it's debut. After Latest Generation won a reasonable race at Doncaster they met again at Newmarket in the Autumn Stakes, where Latest Generation finished a length and a a quarter in front of Maximal. Maximal has a Derby entry, but Latest Generation holds that engagement and also entries in the English and Irish 2,00 Guineas. Latest Generation has drifted like a barge, which is not normally a good sign. But he is 9/1 whereas Maximal has been supported in to 2/1. The Godolphin horse has also been backed in to 9/4. But will LG be totally unfit, given those forthcoming entries? If he is anywhere near there wouldn't be such a disparity with his old adversary. Very speculative of course, but interesting!
Got Summerghand and Her Indoors yesterday but had a couple of Ryan Moore losers. He's just 1 of those jockeys that rarely wins when I back him Having a little nibble on Sam's Adventure in the Scottish National but it really is wide open
That can happen with certain jockeys. I think it's just coincidence although I think twice before backing anything with Oisin Murphy on it. He's one of those jockeys that only seems to win when I'm on something else. You'll have a lot of hard look backing Ryan Moore because he has an obsession with getting from A to B via the shortest route and will only come down the outside if the race is almost up as a last resort. If you see him rattling home late you've spunked your money.
Jamie Spencer used to infuriate me when he rode in the main races. Liked to hold his horses up and come with a late run which is fine as long as you don't hit traffic problems Strangely enough my all time favourite jockey was Scobie Breasley who was definitely a hold up jockey more often than not
