I’m getting a lot of photos in at the moment from all sorts of different places. Here are a few that have just come in; First up, and after a long absence recovering from a broken bone in his foot is Bouguereau; . . Bougie hasn’t been on the course since July 2008, when he was a very different looking …
Nosey
A good run from Marine Boy yesterday, looking for a moment as if he might win. He eventually finished fifth, but the form in these Newmarket handicaps generally stands up and with luck we may win one with him sooner rather than later. No runners today but an excellent days racing. I’ll be siding with Jeremy Noseda in the first …
Watching with interest
A mixed week for the horses with a couple of good seconds but some disappointment as well. Morana ran a really good second to a possibly top class horse at Sandown. It was a good time and these Sandown maidens generally work out very well. I don’t know where we go next but a tilt at the Royal Lodge is …
Subtle hints
Long time no blog. I’ve been out and about for a while now with no blogging time, so a fair bit to catch up on. Last Thursday I went up to Cambridge with Steve Morana, Betfair CFO. We spent the afternoon in the offices of a small company called Featurespace – they are data analysts specialising in fraud detection. I studied …
Massive hole
I’m having a busy time of it at the moment with heavy schedules every day this week, and the blog’s fallen behind again. It doesn’t help that my house is a building site, but we’re getting to the end of that. Tifernati ran on Sunday, and ran a stinker. Jamie felt that there was something seriously wrong with him – …
Hoping
Marine Boy goes today in a listed race at Newbury. It’s been frustrating but I still believe in him – clearly the market is losing faith and his price gets ever longer. The overnight rain (assuming it came) is a positive for him – he doesn’t mind how soft it gets. He’s been disappointing lately but there are no indications …
Triple chance
I actually have pieces of three runners today and two of them are paper favourites. Quaker Parrot runs in the 2:10 at Bath. She’s coming along fine at home and has a respectable chance – it’s really a question of what else is in the race. There are several likely types in the line up that could be smart – …
Asbo
My house is a building site at the moment – they’re working in half of it and we’re living in the other half. The whole place is covered in brick dust – it seems that no matter what we do to keep the dust out it finds a way through. The highlight of the week occurred a couple of days …
More silverware
A win for Astrodome on Wednesday, and hopefully evidence that he has a proper future in jumping. He’s a great looking horse and he jumps like a pro. He could be a decent hurdler and looks like he might have to scope to make up into a proper chaser. Fingers crossed that he continues to progress. Hector Spectre came third …
Skinny bird
It was a busy day with the kids today, although I did manage to find the time to back a couple of losers. We took the boys to the theatre to see the pantomime “Pirate School” – all good fun. At one point the pirate captain asked the audience which countries they had been to. One little boy shouted out …