The Week Ahead

It was a good day for the yard on Sunday when Bathwick Man (pictured above) led home a Pond House 1-2 at Stratford in the 2m6½f handicap hurdle beating stablemate American Art.  Our pair were ridden prominently throughout and stuck to their tasks well with the race between them up the home straight.  Bathwick Man is owned by Wayne and Sarah Clifford, who sponsor our yard and so many races up and down the country and I am always thrilled to get a winner for such wonderful supporters of our sport.  Meanwhile American Art gets on very well with Conor O’Farrell and hinted that a handicap could come his way, particularly on faster ground.

Talking of Conor O’Farrell (pictured right), it is a big week for our young conditional jockey who is over in Ireland for the Galway Festival.  He has a number of rides during the week but the highlight will most certainly be his ride aboard second favourite Daffern Seal in the Galway Plate for Dermott Weld.  Mr Weld broke all records last year with no fewer than seventeen successes at the festival and I am sure that Conor will be hoping that his rich vein of form at the meeting continues!

On this side of the Irish Sea we will not be having any runners over the jumps until Bangor on Friday or Newton Abbot on Saturday, although we will have runners on the level at Goodwood on Tuesday and Wednesday and perhaps even at Ffos Las on Thursday evening.  War Singer drops back to a mile at the Sussex track on Tuesday and will be partnered again by Eddie Ahern – he travelled well through his race last time and hopefully he can go close, although he does have top weight to contend with.

On Wednesday, decent stayer Beyond makes his first flat appearance since finishing a seventh in the Cesarewitch last October and he should be well suited by this marathon 2m5f trip.  He will be partnered by Willy Twiston-Davies who is very good value for his 7lbs claim – that is plenty of weight to take off, particularly over such a trip.  I will probably be in attendance and it will give me a chance to catch another sight of Frankel in the flesh in the Sussex Stakes.  I see that the race has only attracted four runners (including his pacemaker Bullet Train) and I wish that I had put one in myself now…indeed, with over £8,000 on offer just for finishing fifth it would have been well worth doing!

Robin Geffen, owner of Beyond has kindly entrusted me with the training of another talented flat stayer and I am delighted to report the arrival of Investissement.  Investissement was last seen in action when finishing third in last season’s Ebor for John Gosden.  He had previously won a nice handicap at Goodwood although prior to that he had a couple of indifferent runs in exalted company over hurdles for Evan Williams.  Hopefully he will take to timber better second time around, and if he does he is very much one to look forward to.

Finally, I must say how sad I am to see Hereford and Folkestone closing at the end of the year, we have enjoyed success at both courses down the years and it is a shame to see any part of our sport folding.  Conversely I must congratulate the likes of Newton Abbot and Perth for their pioneering free race entry policies.  As far as I am aware they are still the only racecourses to cater for owners in such a way, and paired with the decent levels of prize money on offer, they deserve (and consistently do) attract good fields of runners and excellent attendance from Racegoers.  To my mind, these courses are a first-rate example of how racecourses should be run and if used as a business model for other smaller tracks, I am sure the sad situation at the likes of Hereford and Folkestone could be avoided.