Conor to ride Our Father

                Our Father

Conor O'Farrell will now ride our Hennessy hope Our Father replacing the injured Timmy Murphy.  Our seven year old will run in the colours of the late David Johnson representing the Ives and Johnson families.  He has won first time out the last three seasons before he has lost his form so fingers crossed he can make it four in a row!  This is a very competitive race however and the winner will need to be at the top of their game.  The Johnson family also have an interest in another runner in the race, Rocky Creek so they should be in for an exciting afternoon!  David has five other runners on the Newbury card, starting off with No Secrets in the 1.20pm handicap chase.  He won two chases last term and has gone up in the weights accordingly but fingers crossed he should go well.  Shotavodka, Notus De La Tour and Punjabi run in the 1.50pm handicap hurdle.  Shotavodka ran well at Bangor last time to finish second and has Kieron Edgar on board taking a handy seven pounds off his back.  Notus De La Tour has been plagued by injuries in recent times but could have and each way chance at a big price.  It will be just interesting to see how Punjabi gets on on his Pond House debut.  The 2009 Champion hurdle winner has not shown much form in recent runs and has tumbled down the weights so it will be just nice to see some of his old sparkle this afternoon.  Consigliere is our final runner of the day and he looks to have a big task ahead of him this afternoon although he will always be one of the Pond House favourites.  

Today there are four other meetings on around the country but Newbury is the only card the yard has runners at.  There is also action from Newcastle, Bangor and Towcester plus a flat card at Wolverhampton.  There was no luck for the yard with the runners yesterday.  I thought Tanerko Emery would win the novice chase but unfortunately his jumping let him down at the eight fence.  He will surely win a decent prize this season as he is a lovely horse and we are just pleased to report after a a horrid looking fall he seem okay this morniing which is the main thing.

I see that Harriet Rochester got a warning at Newbury yesterday because her skirt was too short!  The picture of her in today's Racing Post looks great!  Who would you rather look at, Harriet or McCrirrick?  The Newbury officals should go to Aintree on Ladies day if they want to see short skirts!  Keep them short Harriet!

Let's hope they get everyone out of the pub in Glasgow where the helicopter crashed last night.  Hearing news like this puts everything into perspective so my thoughts and best wishes go out to everyone, families and friends of anyone involved.

My four timer for this weekends football is Man City 3/10, Arsenal 4/6, Liverpool 8/13 and Inverness CT 4/11.  Have a nice day.