Frankel Stars Again

What a great weekend of horse racing action and what another incredible perforamance from Frankel to win the QEII at Ascot.  It was some training performance from Henry Cecil to keep this colt producing these sensational performances despite having been on the go since his seasonal debut back in April.  A friend of mine went to the meeting and said that he has never heard the crowd so animated (even before the big races).  The general consensus among the experts is that Frankel is quite possibly the greatest miler that they have ever seen, personally I always wonder why people want him to try further - the best miler of all time would be good enough for me!  He is now finished for the season, but the good news is that he looks likely to be kept in training for next year.

The Champions Stakes - the richest race in Britain was a great contest and was won in brave fasion by Cirrus des Aigles.  Jockey Christophe Soumillon fell foul of the new whip rules and in the process forfeited over £50,000 in prize money and was stood down for five days.  He was one over the limit with six hits in the final furlong - that one extra strike has cost him a small fortune...for what it is worth, I thought that he gave the horse a fantastic ride and hopefully something constructive will be done when the PJA (Professional Jockeys Association) meets with the BHA today.  It must be an important meeting as A P McCoy is missing the opportunity to ride at Plumpton this afternoon in order to attend - A P missing rides is virtually unheard of!

We have one runner on the level this afternoon at Windsor.  Fortunately the meeting will go ahead owing to the BHA agreeing to meet with PJA - it was looking dodgy for a while when there were no jockeys declared for the meeting at the weekend.  Effervesce goes in the 4.00pm race - a 1m2f handicap and will be ridden by Steve Drowne.

Back home, the hard work is continuing and I captuerd a couple more snaps from the gallops.  Midnight Tuesday is a new addition to the Pond House team and is ridden below by Conor O'Farrell.

  
Above left: Midnight Tuesday, and right: Piraya

I also captured Piraya and Frank Hayes on the gallops.  Both of the horses pictured will be out on the racecourse in the near future.