Day Three

                     Dynaste

After another cold night I am pleased to report that Cheltenham has once again beaten the elements and racing goes ahead as planned.  Hexham has unfortunately been lost to the weather and Towcester are inspecting at 8.30am.  It is plenty frosty enough down at Pond House this morning and I even saw some deer on the lawn earlier.  Does it get any better, sunshine, deer and Cheltenham races and hopefully a couple of winners!  David has plenty of runners at Cheltenham today, 10 in fact.  The star turn could be Dynaste who kicks our runners off in the opening race at 1.30pm.  He is unbeaten over fences and has looked fairly impressive, fingers crossed he can keep his record in tact this afternoon.  Ballynagour runs in the Byrne Group chase at 4pm.  He won with any amount in hand on his Pond House debut at Warwick and the handicapper as reacted accordingly but hopefully he still has a great chance.  Let's just hope they both run big races and come home safely.

                   Ballynagour

The stable runners ran okay yesterday in some very competitive races.  Buddy Bolero ran well to finish fourth in the 4 mile amateur chase, while Goulanes was sixth in the RSA and The Liquidator also ran very well to finish a staying on fourth in the Bumper.  One of our owners, Gino Paletta owns half of The New One who won at the Festival yesterday which was fantastic for him.  Gino is a very excitable Italian and he returned to our marquee singing but he appears to be the only Italian who cannot hit a note!  Mind you, he won plenty of pound notes!  The New One looks very useful and was very impressive.  We always stay with Gino when we go to Aintree at the Grand National meeting and I am sure his walls will now be covered in pictures of his horse.  If you see a drunk Italian near the Hollow Bottom pub in Cheltenham this morning that could be Gino!

Sprintre Sacre looks something very special.  He only made one mistake at the top of the hill but he looks a complete superstar.  I see the Henderson team are now in front in the trainers championship.  I think it will be hard for the Nicholls team to keep their title this year but you never know, there is still plenty of prize moeny to be won until the end of the season.

Joseph O'Brien was weighing out for the Bumper yesterday and the clerk of the scales said, "that's unusual Joseph no weight cloth!"  Of the three flat jockeys riding in the race, Graham Lee did best finishing 10th.  Richard Hughes was 13th and O'Brien was 16th.  It must be easier on the flat!  Sir Alex Ferguson was there.  I was going to say that you were a bit lucky against Chelsea but I decided not to!

My Racing Post was ruined by page 41 today!  Have a good one.