Disappointing Friday racing

The 371st edition of the Wayward Lad blog.

No blog for the last couple of days. Personal life has been a bit busy and, as I’m driving to Cornwall (setting off at 6am) on Friday morning, it’s going to be a full weekend. So, when you read this I'll be somewhere on the A30.

On Tuesday I had a “maximum” wager of 2pts on GHIZAO and I was disappointed with the performance from him. I reckon most followers of jumps racing now expect horses from Paul Nicholls stable to arrive at the track fit and ready to run to their peak. My opinion of GHIZAO was that it was an “exploratory” run. He wasn’t jumping well over the 1st-4 fences, but in the 2nd half of the race he jumped admirably . The pace of the race in my opinion was not strong, so all the main contenders were still in with a chance approaching the 3rd-last fence. GHIZAO tho’ just plodded-on. He wasn’t far off the leader at the line, but that’s probably ‘cause CAPTAIN CHRIS fell at the final fence with the race at his mercy. It was not a satisfactory race as it left questions unanswered. But we know that CAPTAIN CHRIS is much better than his OR160 rating as he picked-up the leaders easily before the final fence, responding well to a couple of applications of the whip. As for GHIZAO, he has potential but he needs to learn to jump, and quickly, before his confidence is irreparably damaged.

A couple of ordinary jumps meetings on Friday as the focus of attention in the horseracing world is on Churchill Downs and the Breeders Cup. At Fontwell, it would be no surprise if the heavy rain suffered in the south turns toe going from soft to heavy. As such, I’ll avoid this meeting.
I have gone thru’ every race at Hexham and nothing excites me there – very disappointing fare.

I will be watching the Breeders Cup meeting, but won’t be having a wager on Friday evenings races.

Next week I’ll be looking at making an entry in the Ten-to-Follow competition run by the Racing Post, and I’ll be trying to come up with a useful shortlist. I’ve put a link to a website run by a fan of the competition – Peter Martin – and it’s a site I’ve used for about 8 years. If you are going to attempt the competition, this site is a “must visit”.

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Thanks from Wayward Lad.