- Friday, 23 September 2011 07:08
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
David has one runner at Worcester today, Vertige Dore in the 3.20pm Beginners Chase. Several of you will remember that Vertige Dore did win a chase at the track not long ago but was disqualified and the placings reversed after causing interference to the runner up. Effectively he is a winner without a penalty and he was travelling well behind a useful sort at Hereford last time out when he fell. He has done some jumping practice since and we are hoping he does not show his previous quirks and runs well with Timmy Murphy in the saddle once again.
- Thursday, 22 September 2011 06:56
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
We have a couple more pictures from the gallops to share with you this morning - this time of an old favourite and a somewhat less familiar name. Former Hennessy Gold Cup and Totesport Bowl winner Madison du Berlais is making good progress at home, while Bathwick Brave who showed considerable promise in a couple of bumpers last season was also seen going nicely in a solo gallop.
- Wednesday, 21 September 2011 07:21
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
It was another sad day for racing yesterday as another legendary trainer, Michael Jarvis passed away at the age of 73. Michael was a truly great trainer and I spent many happy times chatting with him at the Newmarket sales. Whenever we were looking to buy horses from the flat to go jumping we would always ask Michael about his horses and he would always offer his own truthful opinion. He had many great horses down the years, but the ones that stood out for me were Arc winner Carroll House and the brilliant but quirky Rakti - he did an amazing job to get this one to win four Group One races. I don't know of anyone with a bad word to say about Michael Jarvis and he will be sadly missed.
- Tuesday, 20 September 2011 07:05
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
It was very sad news yesterday to hear that Ginger McCain had passed away at the age of 80 after a short illness. In the early days when I used to do the Pontins holiday camps I used to play table tennis at Southport and Ginger trained not far from the holiday camp. I remember seeing Red Rum and Billy Ellison galloping along Southport beach and I love that great photo of Billy with his feet right up near Red Rums head. Whenever I saw Ginger at Aintree he always had a lot of people around him and it was always a buzzing atmosphere. He was a larger than life character and his characiture looked more like him than he did himself! When you talk about great characters, Ginger was certainly one of them and there are less and less of people like him around today.
- Monday, 19 September 2011 07:28
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
The stable enjoyed a couple of winners at Uttoxeter yesterday afternoon and I thought that young Conor produced an absolute gem of a ride to land the seller aboard American Art. He didn't look that keen at times and Conor was after him from a very early stage but still managed to coax him to a short head victory. Teshali completed a quickfire double at the track when getting up under a strong ride from Timmy Murphy to score by 1/2 length - Conor was aboard Briefcase and he gave this one a good ride too...I'm not sure he would have been quite so popular in the yard this morning if he had won!
- Sunday, 18 September 2011 00:00
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
It's been ten days without any jump racing but it seems more like ten weeks to me! At last we are back in business with a couple of meetings at Plumpton and Uttoxeter. We have runners at both meetings and Tom Scudamore has elected to go to Plumpton to ride Bathwick Scanno, Arab League, Ladyvie and Surfboard, while Conor O'Farrell picks up the ride on American Art and Taratata Sivola at Uttoxeter and Timmy Murphy rides Teshali. We look to have some sound chances so we will be keeping fingers firmly crossed for a good day.
- Saturday, 17 September 2011 07:19
- Written by Chelsea Eggleton
I thought the stable's runners performed creditably on the flat at Newbury yesterday afternoon, particularly Togiak who finished fourth, beaten only 6 lengths behind comeback horse Dubai Prince. The Godolphin owned winner was making a successful reappearance after recovering from a fracture in the pelvic region - he won in good style and stretched his unbeaten run to three. Winning jockey Kieren Fallon was clearly very impressed and claimed "he has the most beautiful action, I think a mile and a quarter will be his trip". If Fallon says that, he is obviously a bit special.
We have another runner on the flat at Newmarket this afternoon, Big Occasion in the Cesarewitch Trial. He makes his debut for us under Jim Crowley and he was a decent performer in Ireland - he is one of three that we have left in the Cesarewitch on October 8th, the others being Beyond and Tasheba.
