LAST MEETING REVIEW

We were treated to seven brilliant races at our last meeting, that saw Fergal O’Brien register a double.

The day began with a two-mile hurdle race for Novices’, that attracted 11 runners. The very progressive Pop The Champagne headed the market and came in search of a fourth successive win. Paddy Brennan elected to keep her up with the pace and stalked long timer leader Olly’s Folly. Pop The Champagne came there swinging turning for home and quickly took it up under a motionless Paddy Brennan. A slight mistake at the last didn’t halt her progress and she ran out a ready winner to complete the four-timer. Our second race of the day saw four runners take to the track in a tight betting heat. The J P McManus owned Lock’s Corner was sent off the marginal favourite ahead of the Joe Tizzard trained Helford River. Neither would feature in the finish and it instead would go the way of Coal Stock, who put in an excellent round of jumping under Harry Kimber. The only real scare for punters came at the second last however El Paso was a good way

back in second and failed to capitalise. Litterale Ci quickly made amends for the disappointing effort of Lock’s Corner in our third race 1 1 for J P McManus. The Harry Fry nine-yearold was involved in our most thrilling race of the day so far 4 and narrowly got the better of Vision Des Flos. The two had pulled a long way clear of the market favourite Hooper and gave us a brilliant battle in our third race of the day. Romanor dispatched his rivals with ease in our fourth and feature race of the day. Fergal O’Brien once again had the favourite with Paddy Brennan booked in search of a double on the day. However, it was not to be for the pair who were soundly beaten by Romanor and Michael Nolan for Seamus Mullins.

3

He had clearly benefitted from the recent wind operation and made a good field look very ordinary. The two Bens linked up in the Dan Rowe Legend 50th Blast Handicap Hurdle. Ben Jones opted to hold the favourite up dead last before coming with a strong run to claim the prize. Ben Godfrey had made sure they’d gone an honest enough gallop on Every Breaking Wave and this played into Little Jessture’s hands perfectly. Loved Out emerged as her biggest danger but never looked like getting to the six-year-old mare. Our penultimate race was a bit of a penalty kick for Mortlach and despite some sketchy jumping at times, Jack Hogan always looked as though he had enough to see off the challenge of Restandbethankful. Our final race was run over the same distance as our first and went the way off the Archie Watson trained Al Zaraqaan. Known for his flat runners, it was great to see Archie have a winner at the track and despite racing keenly under Nick Scholfield in the early stages, he had more than enough in the tank to hold off the late charge of Karannelle and Sean Bowen.

5 7

PHOTOS:

1  POP THE CHAMPAGNE 2  COAL STOCK 3  LITTERALE CI 4  ROMANOR 5  LITTLE JESSTURE 6  AL ZARAQAAN 7  MORTLACH