It's funny how race-pace can so badly scupper your betting plans and that's pretty much what happened with both of my selections on Wednesday. King Torus was the lesser fancied of my selections (by me!), but ran a cracker to finish in 4th place and looked likely to win at one point towards the concluding stages. His effort flattered out from there on in though, under considerate handling, and he remains one to keep on side when it looks like he'll get a race run to suit. Unfortunately, he sat too close to what was an overly generous pace on this occasion and that's what stopped him from running an even better race.
Accession disappointed due to the complete opposite, as he was dropped in towards the rear and was never in with a chance of making up ground on the back of a very slow gallop. The fact that he drifted so markedly before the off possibly reflected what was expected in any regard but in the end it wouldn't have mattered even if he was smashed in the betting. He's never going to be able to cut it at that level when there isn't a generous pace on and forgiving this run is a much. He's far better than that, I can assure you!
-3.00pts on the day. Form of last 10 selections; 2-4-0-3-4-1-9-4-4-0 (1 winner & 4 places).
Frustrating stuff of late with a blatant lack of betting opportunities, made worse by the fact that I'm feeling really confident in my ability to pick out good value selections. Everything should return to normal once the weather decides to play nice. Today looks a bit better, although we've had to head up north to find our pair of selections. They're running in races where you can't be assured of a whole lot but they look like decent ones to me and who knows, maybe one could oblige. Hopefully that'll be the case and best of luck folks.
Will also have Aprils statistics online very soon (they make for fine reading). Laziness has hindered me!
The class-dropping Oriental Scot will have a tough job on his hands to overcome a sit in stall 12 of 12 but I'm willing to take a chance on him despite that rather mediocre draw. William Jarvis' imposing 5-year-old doesn't have a great record when stepping up to trips beyond a mile but this track isn't much of a stamina test at all and there should be no question of the 1m 1f trip being an issue. What may well be an issue is how this race will be run, as the horse would be much more suited by a solid gallop throughout this race and that doesn't look assured. That will hinder most of his rivals though and as a horse who doesn't lack in the speed department, he might get away with it; plus there is a chance that something will make it a good test. William Jarvis is a man that I've always marked down as knowing the time of day and the fact that he's willing do to a 700-mile round-trip to have just one runner has to be taken as a very big positive. If his charge was to run to the level that I think he can - assuming everything panned out perfectly in the run - I expect that he has a few lengths in hand of this field off his current rating of 83. A race rarely works out to completely favour one horse, so it's not as simple as that and I can't recommend much more than the usual stakes here. The horse has run quite encouraging races on both of his outings this season though and should run a big race if he gets some luck. Of the rest; Euston Square is one to watch with a view to backing later in the season. I think that he may be in need of the outing and could do with a stiffer test.
Everyone here knows of my admiration for the wonderful David Barron by now and he has decided to step his exciting 4-year-old gelding, Elusive Prince, up to 7f for the first time - a move that really should provide dividends at some point throughout the season, hopefully now. The only reason he's available at such a large price is due to his seemingly disappointing reappearance run at Doncaster (6f) last month, but it's completely forgiveable. Firstly, he was hampered in the early stages of the race and being drawn where he was proved to be a negative, because he had no pace to aim at and unsurprisingly struggled badly as a result. To say that he was given a "considerate" ride by Lee Newman would be an understatement and it may prove to be that connections were expecting him to come on for the run (Barron's other horse in the race won it). This race represents a drop in class and although carrying top-weight against quite decent opposition will be no easy task, the horse could be very attractively rated off 90 if he can bounce back to be in the same form as when he sluiced in over 6f at Ripon in August of last year. That was off 5lbs lower, in a race where they went very quick from the off and I'm expecting similar goings-on here. He shaped as if an extra furlong would do him no harm back then and although today's rivals are better, he is the type who should improve with an extra winter under his belt. The betting should be very interesting and any market support will be a massive positive as to our chances. 16/1 is quite simply too big anyway and a standard stakes bet will suffice again. I'm quite sure that we'll be seeing a return from following this horse through the year. He is very smart, open to progression and should be suited to how things will pan out here.
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