John Burke

Good Morning all,

Some top class racing this weekend at Newbury on Saturday and Leopardstown on Sunday.

I will have a look at some notable performances from the Newbury card in this week’s column and also give you one for the tracker that meeting.

Last but not least, I will attempt to follow up last weeks 3rd place effort by Dutch Canyon at 20/1, with this week’s selection from stats corner and also have a quick peek at next Saturday’s big betting race the Betfred Grand National Trial at Haydock.Read More »Marshgate Lane

Scottish Trials Weekend: A Poor Guide to Cheltenham

This weekend’s horse racing may not have had the pathos of last one or the indeed the quality but there was some good action at Sandown and at Musselburgh who were hosting their two day Scottish Trials meeting. It’s the first time the meeting has been held over two days and you can hardly say the quality of the meeting has improved for it although the first running of the Edinburgh National over 4m 1f so a good field entered. Some have marketed the fixture as a good guide for Cheltenham next month but its more hype over substance. If the past is any guide I doubt any of the runners in the “Trials” races will go onto win a race at the Festival. Those thoughts are also borne out by the stats. In the past five years those horses having run at this meeting and gone on to run there next race at the festival are:

1 winner from 64 runners 2% -47 A/E 0.27 9 placed 14%Read More »Victor’s Monday Musings

Morning all,

This week’s article should have been looking back at the best performances of Festival Trials Day at Cheltenham but sadly events on Saturday cast a big shadow on the day. Before looking at a couple of the best performances of the weekend, One For The Tracker and of course a selection from Stats Corner for today’s racing I will firstly share some thoughts about the sad loss of a Grand National winner and true equine hero!Read More »Three from Three?

Bristol’s Breathtaking Haydock Win

There is no better sight in horse racing than seeing a bold jumping chaser in action. It’s what the jumping game is all about. On Saturday we saw one of the best jumpers of a fence in Bristol De Mai not just win chase on Saturday by 22 lengths but we saw him jump a field of solid handicappers into the ground when winning the Peter Marsh Handicap Chase on paper it looked a stronger race than recent renewals but the six year old made his 14 rivals look very ordinary indeed. It was for me the jumping performance of the season. An absolute joy to watch and he’s a real credit to his handler Nigel Twiston-Davies

There were doubts before the race about his stamina for the test on Saturday but there was never any doubt about his jumping or how well he travels in his races. Always up with the leaders he was ridden as though there were no doubts that he would see out the trip on such testing ground. Two out there was never any doubt that Bristol De Mai was going to win and a mistake by runner up Otego Trail at the last just accentuated the margin of victory rather than had any impact on the final result.Read More »Victor’s Monday Musings