Royal Ascot Finale

Today is day five, the final day of this year's Royal Ascot.  There is also flat racing at Newmarket, Redcar, Lingfield and Haydock plus there is jumps action up at Perth.  In Ireland there is action on the flat at Down Royal.  The stable does not have any runners today but we do have two at Worcester tomorrow so check back here in the morning for more news.  Conor O'Farrell who was here riding out earlier in the week has four rides up at Perth and looks to have good chance of having a winner.  In the juvenile race at Market Rasen yesterday, the Alex Hales trained Family Time, who finished second to Koi Dodville at Hexham when he won, ran well and finished second again.  It just helps give the form some context and it is interesting to try and work out where the juveniles, new to jumping, fit into the ladder on level of ability.  Time will tell and it is interesting to follow over the next few months.

Yesterday's Royal meeting at Ascot was full of drama for several reasons!  More than an inch of rain fell overnight and into the morning at the track and there was a strong chance that racing could have been abandoned with a 12.45pm inspection called.  It was great that everyone gave the meeting every chance to go ahead and although there were numerous non-runners and some horses failed to show their form there was still plenty of high class action for everyone to watch.  It was a memorable day for jockey Oisin Murphy for several reasons.  Having crossed the line in front in the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup on board the Archie Watson trained Dragon Symbol, he then lost the race in the stewards rooms with the prize going to America and the Wesley Ward trained Campanelle ridden by Frankie Dettori being awarded the race.  Even though many experts agree that Dragon Symbol is probably the better horse, he did cause interference to Campanelle and with the winning margin so small there was always going to be a strong chance the places would be reversed.  While heart-breaking for all those concerned in the Watson team I felt it was the right decision by the stewards.  Oisin's day took a turn for the better however as just 35 minutes later he was the winner of the Group 1 Coronation Stakes aboard Alcohol Free for the Andrew Balding team.  He went on to record a double as well as he won the Duke of Edinburgh Stakes on Quickthorn for Hughie Morrison.  Racing is such a funny old game and such a great leveller.  

ITV racing are broadcasting all of todays seven races from Royal Ascot where there are some classy horses in action once again.  Fingers crossed the worst of the weather has passed and there shouldn't be any issues in this department today.  The Diamond Jubilee Stakes at 4.20pm is one of the feature races on the card and Dream of Dreams, beaten a head in the last two runnings of this race looks to have a leading chance once again.  Trained by Sir Michael Stoute and ridden by Ryan Moore they have him in at 9/4.  I think I am going to stay away from trying to find anymore winners at Royal Ascot, it has been very tough to find them this week!

Unfortunately the big football game went as I thought it perhaps might last night - it was pretty dull and boring from an English perspective!  Credit to Scotland who played with passion and played quite well but England lacked enthusiasm and desire in my opinion and a 0-0 draw just summed up the game.  It does mean that England are second in their group on goal difference behind the Czech Republic, who they play in their last group game.  While it should mean we qualify, I don't fancy our chances of getting too far in the tournament against better teams.  Scotland now need to win against Croatia in their next match and hope England beat the Czech Republic to give them any chance of qualifying.  At least there are no real bragging rights to anyone at Pond House this morning!  In yesterday's other games Croatia and the Czech Republic played out a 1-1 draw while Sweden beat Slovakia 1-0.  Today, the game I am most looking forward to is Portugal versus Germany at 5pm which should be entertaining.  Hungary play France at 2pm and Spain play Poland at 8pm.

I have also been following the US Open Golf and a relatively unknown British player, Richard Bland is currently tied for the lead at 5 under at the half way stage.  Playing conditions look tough and there is not much separating the whole field so it should be an interesting watch later.

Two tomatoes were walking across the street, one in front of the other.  The first tomato was getting impatient because the second one was so slow.  Then half-way across the seciond tomato was run over by a car.  The first tomato shouted "Hey ketchup!"  Have a good day.