Juliette's weekly frolic
So the favourite gets beat, brought down or, as on Saturday, falls. You swear a little, drink a lot, double your stake on the next race and there the matter ends. It takes a dramatic defeat like Crisp's in the National, brought home by a searching television interview with Richard Pitman, for most of us to appreciate the effect such reverses have on the morale of an entire stable yard. This last Saturday, apart from Bula's capsize, Fred Winter saddled no fewer than three frustrating seconds and if, like me, you had spent much of the previous hight and following morning deep in Ivor Herbert's Winter's Tale (which, on reflection, is highly unlikely since the book's not published for three weeks and is technically an unmentionable subject '01 then) you would have gone some way to understanding the anguish suffered by all from Winter and Pitman to 'Loppy' Smailes, the horse box driver whose special charge, Sonny Somers, so nearly did a successful recovery job on the Ginger Wine spoils.
Winter is unlikely to have a runner in the flashiest handicap of the season, Saturday's Schweppes Gold Trophy, but by originally entering Lanzarote (an automatic 12.7 topweight) he has done his fellow trainers a good turn in the handicapping of their charges. With no representatives from Price, Sutcliffe or, if it gets any softer, Gifford either, the race loses its closed shop reputation and something of its glamour. I could happily make out a case for a dozen horses from the maiden charms of Flash Imp to the schizophrenic Firefright, but it seems the ideal opportunity for a horse from some far-flung county to edge his way into the record books — and Lot (Yorkshire, 11.2), Something's Missing (Devon, 10.12) and Casbah (Cheshire, 10.8) are all excellently handicapped. Although the last-named is now a seven-year-old, he is renowned for consistency in big, tough handicaps. Apart from his first run, he's not been out of the first four in seven such races, has won two Ladbroke-sponsored events, failed by a head to give 19Ib to Saturday's winner, Fighting Taffy, and is better off with all who finished in front and behind when fourth in last month's Wills Hurdle.
Newbury gives the hurdlers top billing on Friday as well, when the Stroud Green Hurdle will see Peter O'Sullevan's Attivo out to prove his cruising victory at Cheltenham was as meritorious as the winning margin suggests. Personally I'm inclined to chance a little on Young Robert. Bumped badly at Chepstow in December, he'd scored five victories 'beforerunning second to Ashendene when supported by me, but few others, in the Daily Express Triumph Hurdle Trial.
Still travelling backwards, Thursday sees the big money staying with the smaller obstacles, though the star attraction of Haydock's Premier Long Distance Hurdle is likely to be a convalescent 'chaser, Charlie Potheen. The winner, however, must be Swift Shadow whose youth gives him a useful weight advantage over his older rivals, Moyne Royal and Be My Guest.
Assets: £67.45. Ootlay: £3 to win Swift Shadow & Young Robert, £2 ew Casbah.
Previous page
