Picture By Noah Salzman
Main event of the week was the 3-day Dante meeting at York, with the eponymous race taking place on Thursday.
Aidan O’Brien‘s ante-post Derby favourite The Lion In Winter was sent off at odds-on, despite the trainer’s opinion that the horse was undercooked and his opinion was borne out with his charge finishing a well-beaten 6th.
Surprise winner was Pride of Arras from the Ralph Beckett yard, which put in a visually impressive performance to win what we think may have been a sub-standard race.
Post race, connections of The Lion In Winter expressed complete satisfaction with the run, with Ryan Moore ‘very happy’ and, although the bookmakers’ immediate reaction was to knock the horse out to 6-1 for Epsom, he is now back in to just 5-2.
Go figure – we still think Delacroix is the one to be on.
The Group 1 Lockinge Stakes at Newbury on Saturday provided even more angst for Kieran Shoemark, after his replacement, Oisin Murphy, came home in front on Lead Artist , turning round a deficit of more than twelve lengths with Dancing Gemini from three weeks earlier.
Earlier in the week the surprise announcement of her immediate retirement from racing by Rachel Blackmore will mean the sport of kings losing one of the best pound-for-pound jump jockeys there has ever been.
Although the reason for her sudden exit is perhaps not clear, the recent three month absence due to a serious neck injury may well have played a part.
Sticking to the jumps game, we have to doff our hypothetical cap to Harry Skelton, who pitched up at Worcester on Tuesday and rode a 1000+-1 five-timer, four trained by bruvver Dan.
Whether he can keep pace with Sean Bowen in the jump jockey’s title race is debatable but it looks like he’s gonna have a good try.
Away from the glitz and the glamour, we have quietly thrown in another ten winners during the week, at prices from evens and all stations up to 15-2.
Roll on next week.
