Long Run then, the RSA Chase favourite, what do you make of him? The best thing since the thing that was the best thing before sliced bread came along and ruined it for all the good things, according to the majority of people who generally know about these things; a stalactite perched precariously on the precipice, if you ask the silent minority, or those for whom alliteration is king.

Incidentally, on the whole sliced bread thing, there have been many good things since sliced bread – the internet and Sinndar in the Irish Derby to name but two, and I’m not sure that the telex didn’t come along after they managed to split the bread – and surely one of them was a better thing than Peter Lyons’s finest. I’m not even fully convinced that the sliced pan is that good a thing. Give me a batch loaf that you can get a knife at and cut as thick as you like before smothering it with a couple of lumps of butter and a spoonful of raspberry jam any day.Read the rest of this entry »

We’ll win the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle anyway, that’s for sure. Sure isn’t Dunguib the best novice to put his head through a bridle since Golden Cygnet? Don’t mind about his jumping, it’s only the English saying he can’t jump, trying to convince themselves, and he won’t have to jump over the hurdles anyway, he can kick every one of them out of the ground if he wants and Brian O’Connell will still be able to stop for a pint at the Guinness Village on the way up the home straight before standing up in his irons at the furlong pole.

(Big cheer.)

We’ll win the Arkle as well I’d say. Read the rest of this entry »

There was a time, a couple of years ago, that you couldn’t walk down any main street in Ireland on any day within four and a half weeks of the third Tuesday in March but you would happen upon a pre-Cheltenham evening.  That’s not the case any more, but nor have they gone the way of the cigarette-smoking dinosaurs.  The good ones and the good causes have survived.

They fill a need, that’s for sure.  The appetite for Cheltenham around these parts is pretty much insatiable these days, it’s a perennial thing, Cheltenham talk and Cheltenham thoughts the meat and drink, pre-Cheltenham evenings the pieces of bread that keep you going until the main course arrives.Read the rest of this entry »

There is a big difference between taking a five-year-old racing and taking a three-year-old racing, even if the three-year-old was the five-year-old two years ago, if you follow.  (Humans we’re talking about here now, little people, not horses.)  Incidentally, neither activity is in the same ballbark as taking a three-year-old and a one-year-old racing at the same time, or taking a four-year-old, a two-year-old and a zero-year-old racing, even if you do have help on hand.  You don’t want to be taking full responsibility for the three of them, that’s for sure, not if experience is any kind of a guide (one racecourse is not big enough), unless, of course, you are into penance (it is Lent after all).  Even if you are, better to wear sack-cloth and flail yourself periodically with a cat o’nine tails than to try to master the three of them and a seven-race-card all at once.Read the rest of this entry »

Kilcrea Castle, Racing Post Chase?  Big chance.  He looked like a potential Racing Post Chase horse when he finished third to The Sawyer in a two-mile-five-and-a-half-furlong handicap chase at Ascot last time.  He travelled well in that race, he jumped well and he looked a real threat to The Sawyer rounding the home turn, but lack of a recent run seemed to tell in the home straight, and he couldn’t sustain his effort, surrendering second place to Miss Mitch on the run-in.

Dig a little deeper.  Read the rest of this entry »

My Grand National shortlist just got longer. That’s what the publication of the weights does to you, focuses your attention and makes you do some research, the inevitable result of which is the formation of opinions.

Slight digression: I’m dammed if I can figure out the methodology behind the framing of the weights. It’s a perennial thing at this stage, why can’t every horse run off its correct handicap mark, why does Albertas Run have 5lb less to carry just because it is the Grand National than he would have to carry if he was running in the Scottish National or the Eider Chase or the Midlands National, why are some horses allotted higher ratings to increase the chance that they will get a run (doesn’t that mean that other horses’ chances of getting a run are decreased, and in what way is that fair?), why is Irish Invader’s Grand National mark 5lb higher than his Irish mark and 10lb higher than the mark off which he ran last year, when he finished 11th, beaten over 40 lengths, despite the fact that he hasn’t run since? He’s well named.Read the rest of this entry »

Five myths about Saturday’s Totesport Trophy:

Myth 1: A two-mile handicap hurdle, with about 127 runners and 26lb between top and bottom weight, sponsored by a bookmaker, which was won in 2007 by a 50/1 shot, it is a bookmakers’ benefit gig.

Perhaps surprisingly, it isn’t really. True, Heathcote’s win three years ago was a bit of a thunder cloud in the Sahara, but excepting that one, the race is generally won by a fairly well-fancied runner. Four of the last eight winners were priced at 15/2 or shorter and, excepting Heathcote, you have to go back to Within The Law in 1979 to find the last winner who was sent off at greater than 16/1. It is actually a punters’ race.Read the rest of this entry »

Punting Low 1: Zaarito. Again. I think I have now backed Zaarito more often than he has run. It was all going swimmingly, he settled well, he jumped really well, he moved through his field well, he moved easily up just behind long-time leader Citizen Vic going to the last, looking by far the most likely winner, hold your breath. (We know how this one ends, it is a Punting Low after all.) Down. Of course, when a horse falls it is easy to look back at the tape and point out something that the jockey might have done differently. Davy Condon allowed him go in and pop, obviously happy that all he had to do was land on the far side of the fence upright, he didn’t have to make ground at the obstacle, the rider went for the safe option, but he just got in a little tight. If Davy had asked him for a long one, he might have made it, who knows? I got a text from a friend after the race: What price did he trade in-running?Read the rest of this entry »

With Denman sitting at home in his box on Saturday, anxious about the volume of sales of his new scarf (dark green with a white chevron and chequered ends) and disconsolate at the fact that it is not as tastefully designed as that of his next door neighbour Kauto Star (green with yellow spots, purple trimmings), Cheltenham Festival Trials Day at (strangely) Cheltenham went ahead without him, in grave danger of wresting the Most Outlandish Claim Of The Year So Far title from the guy at Irish Life and Permanent who said that they really had the best interests of their customers at heart.Read the rest of this entry »

A frog was swimming merrily along in his favourite stream one fine summer’s day. The sun was shining, a cool breeze was blowing, and everything was good in the world.

Suddenly, the frog heard a voice behind him.

“Good day to you, Mr Frog.”Read the rest of this entry »