Fantastic Five For McCoy!

Well, it's been a wet old start to the day with 20mm of rain falling on the gallops at Pond House during the last 24 hours, although there looks to be a break in the skies now which will come as some relief to those riding out this morning.  There are four meetings taking place this afternoon - three on the flat at Newbury, Doncaster and Wolverhampton as well as a good looking jumps card at Fakenhan.  I see that Nicky Henderson runs one there that is 9lbs ahead of the handicapper - First In The Queue won a conditional jockeys' race at Cheltenham last week and so escapes a penalty this afternoon.  He is due to go up by 9lbs in future handicaps so he looks to have good prospects of following-up this afternoon.

What a day for champion jockey A P McCoy yesterday as he rode a fantastic five winners at Carlisle, taking him through the 100 winner mark for the 19th consecutive season.  He now only needs another twenty winners to get to 4,000...the best jockey of all time by a country mile.

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I am sure that Andrew Balding will be watching Attheraces tomorrow morning at 7.40am as it is the Group One Cox Plate in Australia and he has Side Glance taking part.  With £1million in prize money up for grabs, I'm sure I would be watching it if I had a runner!  Mull Of Killough also represents the English as he participates for Jane Chapple-Hyam.  Even if they finish 6th, they still pick up over £64,000 - that should just about cover the expenses!

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It just goes to show how professional the Aidan O'Brien team are - some of his team completed their build-up for next week's Breeders Cup by doing some work at Southwell yesterday.  He gave Declaration Of War a spin over a mile on the fibresand, along with Irish 2,000 Guineas winner Magician.   Both colts were ridden by son Joseph, in company with other Group winning stablemates - the best bunch of horses to appear at the track by some way I would imagine!  Anyway, the surface is the closest to the conditions they will be facing when they head to Santa Anita.  Let's hope for another good meeting for the Europeans.

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Below, another chance to catch our video interview with jockey Conor O'Farrell...

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Our cricketers have arrived in Australia for the start of the winter Ashes tour.  It should make for an interesting series with the weather conditions very different down under.  I wouldn't be at all surprised if things are much closer than the betting would suggest.

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Sir Alex Ferguson's book is certainly stirring up a few hornet's nests.  In it he claimed that Liverpool ace Steven Gerrard is not a 'top, top player'.  I hate to admit it, but I think that the England captain is a world-class player and a credit to his profession.  Mind you, I bet Sir Alex is selling a lot of books!