Go Bougie go

I’ve been very busy this week with work – no time to bet and no time to blog.  Annoyingly I missed out on backing a horse I’d been waiting for for a long time – Zaskar trained by Tom Dascombe is a lovely filly with a real turn of foot, and she went in in the week.  Of course I’d …

The big rematch

The Irish Guineas comes around, and Winker is still on the sidelines.  I’d love him to be taking them on, but he’ll have to wait a little longer.  On paper it’s a rematch between New Approach and HenrytheNavigator, but the Irish Guineas doesn’t always follow the script. Last year the winners of the English Guineas, Cockney Rebel and Finsceal Beo both …

Mortgage job

I’ve been ringing around this morning and I’m feeling a sense of optimism from some of my trainers.  Pete’s horses haven’t been going as well as usual, but I think they are picking up now.  Brian is starting to have a few winners, and Tom’s horses seem to be in decent shape. I’ve decided to leave Bouguereau in the Derby …

Winker waits

We left Winker out of the Irish 2,000 today – he’s back in work but short of full fitness and it’s too soon for him.  He’ll probably go straight to Royal Ascot now. It’s going to be a fairly quiet week runner wise.  Scrapper Smith may come out towards the end of the week and he’s a lot better at …

Lockinge day

No luck yesterday with King’s Head.  I spoke to Gary before the race – he thought the ground was slightly on the soft side of good rather than the fast side as I had originally thought.  KH will win again whan the going is fast. One runner tonight – Parisian Gift goes at Doncaster.  We had a good punt on …

Fit for a King

I had hoped for three runners today but I’m down to one after the two Maxes pulled out.  He’s a good one though – King’s Head runs at Aintree tonight, and if the rains stay away I see no reason why he won’t go in again.  He’s fit and well. Nine days break isn’t a lot, but I don’t think …

Stud duty

Jane and I had an excellent day out on Monday when we had a tour of a couple of stud farms in the Newbury area.  We dropped the children off early and I gave the dog a quick walk.  I’d ordered a driver for the day and we left home at around 9:30 – an hour later we met up with Guy …

Odds-on failure

Another weekend of dashed hopes, capped with Bouguereau finishing down the field in 7th in the Italian Derby.  Well at least I can say I’ve had an odds-on favourite in a Group 1, which is rare enough.  Bouguereau is a super horse, but he’s a big, fairly lean galloping type with real staying power – he isn’t a speedster, and …

Michel gets in

A winner on Tuesday night with Kings Head doing it nicely.  We€™ve believed for a while that he is a decent hurdler in the making and it€™s good to see a little proof of that.  He needs top of the ground and he doesn€™t get that often in the winter months, so he€™ll probably always be a summer horse.  His …

On a decent mark

The first piece of collateral form for Bouguereau comes today with Patkai, who runs in the final race at Chester.  I like him as a bet.  He was staying on in the Newbury race and will surely benefit from the extra two furlongs – he may also prefer the ground today.  90 doesn’t look like too harsh a mark and the …