Another New Recruit

There are four flat cards taking place this afternoon at Brighton, Catterick, Kempton and Leicester so I'm afraid if you are a fan of the jumps you are out of luck.  Champion jockey Richard Hughes has five rides at Kempton while his title rival Ryan Moore has seven at Kempton as well as a further ride at Leicester.  It looks like it is going to be a cracking finish to the flat season with Moore currently leading by just one winner - I thought that Ryan had given up on the championship...it would seem not.

There are four flat cards taking place this afternoon at Brighton, Catterick, Kempton and Leicester so I'm afraid if you are a fan of the jumps you are out of luck.  Champion jockey Richard Hughes has five rides at Kempton while his title rival Ryan Moore has seven at Kempton as well as a further ride at Leicester.  It looks like it is going to be a cracking finish to the flat season with Moore currently leading by just one winner - I thought that Ryan had given up on the championship...it would seem not.

Talking of flat racing, I see that David claimed an impressive winner at Windsor yesterday.  Dalgig won the 1m2f claimer by three lengths, staying on strongly in the rain softened ground in a race that saw the form horses come to the fore.  David has excelled with horses from sellers and claimers with Purple 'N Gold and Houston Dynimo both recent acquisitions from the bottom grade and both subsequently winning races and finishing placed in Listed contests.  It will be interesting to see how he gets on with Dalgig, but you would imagine that an imminent hurdling career beckons.

Above is a nice picture of winning point-to-pointer Sivron in action on the gallops.  I see that David has him entered at Chepstow in a 2m4f novices' hurdle on Saturday so he is clearly likely to be seen on the racecourse very soon.

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There was unbridled joy for trainer Caroline Bailey yesterday as she welcomed in her winner Prince de Marais at Stratford.  It was his first win since 2011 and the way she was running along and celebrating, you would have thought it was her first ever winner.  Racing is all about stories like this and I was delighted for her.  Meanwhile, I didn't realise that this was jockey Andrew Thornton's first winner at the track for 20 years - that is some losing run!

There were only four runners in the National Hunt flat race at Stratford yesterday and I cannot understand why these races are not attracting more runners.  Having said that, with a first prize of only £1,559 I might just have answered my own question.

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I cannot believe that Kevin Pietersen's book is got to a serialist in teh Telegraph, I thought it would have been in The Sun or The Daily Star.  If you call your teammates "a bunch of useless (expletive)" you will upset a few and they will turn against you and that is exactly what has happened.  He was a very talented cricketer but he clearly doesn't have a great deal between the ears!

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Harry Redknapp has not yet signed his new contract which is on his desk at QPR.  He says he may quit football at the end of the season which would be a massive shame for the sport.  I guess that is what managing QPR does for you!  The players are showing no fighting spirit and I wouldn't be surprised to see Harry join son Jamie on Sky!

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If you get blinded by colour coming down the M6 or the M5 today, don't panic...it will only be owner Stuart Mercer on his way down to Pond House!  It will almost be one of Stuart's ties that you can see - I will get him to put the dip switch on!

Finally, don't forget to take a look at David's weekly blog which features a video interview with the man himself.  Broadcaster Mike Vince joined us last week to talk with members of the team behind the scenes and gather some horses to follow for the season ahead.  If you saw last year's interviews you will have been steered in the direction of Dell' Arca and Western Warhorse among others, so hopefully we will be able to pin point a few more winners this time around.  We will be posting all of the interviews here and on David's blog over the coming weeks.

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