Good morning all,

So much on over the next few days, today looks like a day of writing but then it's Uttoxeter (Ladies Day, fast becoming my Mastermind specialist subject) and then, excitingly, working in the ring at Ascot Saturday. Hopefully a better experience than the last time we went to Ascot when we took 20-odd bets in three races and packed up.

Anyway, I don't think I'll be able to make Worcester today bar a miracle this morning (i.e, there's only about 40 runners at Uttoxeter tomorrow and it takes me just a couple of hours to sort through them at 10) but I have had a look at a card not without some interest. Read More »Worcester Wonders

Good morning all,

Over the weekend I managed to rip a hole in pair of my favourite jeans, and given yesterday's racing didn't make much appeal I decided to have a wander into town to go and buy a new pair.

After finding a pair I liked, I realised it was almost time for my one bet yesterday, Oliver's Gold, to run at Cartmel so I had reason to call into the local bookmakers.

Now, I don't go into bookies offices very much any more, so it came as a bit of a shock to find the place absolutely deserted at 3pm in the afternoon. Where have all the people gone? Those characters of yesteryear that I'm sure we all knew, whether it be on course or at the track? I recall a few that I knew on today's piece, plus today's pick from Nottingham.Read More »Characters

Good morning all,

The second part of my article of jumps trainers currently finding life hard on the main piece, and if you haven't, I would advise you to go and have a quick read of Phil's comment on yesterday's piece as he makes a couple of very relevant points.

I would say that, despite the virus that seemed to spread throughout Newmarket last year, that trainers do try and cope with it in different ways – some go for the complete shutdown of operations to try and find the cause but I do know of at least one yard that had the virus with some of their horses but continued on – they simply found the sick horses, quarantined them away from the healthy ones and as a result, had a really good spell of winners. So even when you know there's a sickness in a yard, it doesn't mean they can't have winners. But I agree with Phil, you should be able to find out when a trainer has sick horses rather than having to try and work it out for yourself, and then you can make your own judgements. Read More »More Trainer Struggles