No such thing as a lucky break in racing

I suppose it could be described as a bad week with Watson Lake beaten at Navan on Saturday and Aran Concerto not running. I pulled Aran Concerto out of the last race at Navan because I was concerned about the ground, but then at Downpatrick on Sunday a good horse which was having only his second run for us, Brynner, broke a leg in a hunters" chase and that was the end of him. He was a nice horse and had finished third in a similar type of race at Down Royal a few weeks ago, but that"s the way things go in this game. I sent a couple of horses to Fairyhouse on Monday, they were announcing the weights for the Irish Grand National and a number of trainers were invited to gallop some horses as part of the launch of the event. I couldn"t go myself as I had to attend a Horse Racing Ireland (HRI) board meeting which went on all day, but everything went well at Fairyhouse and it was interesting that handicapper Noel O"Brien decided to drop the top weight by two pounds from the traditional 12-0 to 11-12. Jim Dreaper"s Notre Pere heads the handicap. The one horse that sort of jumped out at me when I saw the weights was Tony Martin"s Royal County Star which won at Navan on Saturday. He would appear to be well in as he only received five pounds for that success. Tony"s horse was rated 140 and he beat two horses that were rated 154 (Watson Lake) and 156 (Glenfinn Captain). In the past, I"ve seen horses raised by as much as 14 pounds for a win like that, but with only a five-pound penalty he would certainly have to considered as a lively contender. Watson Lake ran up to his best form, he was rated slightly behind the runner-up, Glenfinn Captain, and he was half-a-length off him at the end, but Royal County Star mugged both of them, he came home well and got there by a head. It was tight finish. There aren"t too many options now for Watson Lake and, as I indicated last week, it"s unlikely that he will run again this season. Regarding Aran Concerto, I just got a bit worried about the ground because it was drying out so much and it was very bare, I felt it wouldn"t have been fair to run him, especially as we are hoping to go for a big race, the Powers Gold Cup, next week at Fairyhouse. Aran is a huge horse with a massive stride, he probably would have handled the ground at Navan, but I felt it wasn"t worth taking the risk on this occasion. Aintree is the focus of attention this weekend and already we have a casualty, Afistsullofdollars is lame and can"t run in the Grand National on Saturday. At this stage we would run Afistfullofdollars wherever we could, provided he was sound, he might even be retired as he is getting on a bit. That leaves us with Mattock Ranger for Aintree, if he gets in he will run, but I think he needs about 17 to come out for that to happen, there are no riding plans finalised, but I"m sure we will be able to get someone to ride him as Paul Carberry is still on the sidelines. My own fancy for the race was War Of Attrition, but he is not running now either, so it"s difficult to know, I suppose you would have to look at what Ruby Walsh is on, he"s never too far off the mark. Another possible contender for us at Liverpool is Jered, he worked well at home this week and will go for the Aintree Hurdle, so I"d be hoping for a good run there as he ran no race in the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham, but will have benefited from the experience. Paul is on the mend and is due to have some more scans this week, the results will determine his return date, but at this stage I think the best we can hope for is that he might make it back in time for Fairyhouse. The main thing is that he is in good form and looking forward to getting back to action. The two horses I sent to Fairyhouse on Monday last were Casey Jones and Parsons Pistol, at this stage I hope to run both of them. Richard Dunwoody was also there, he is the racing ambassador for the Irish Grand National Festival and he had the opportunity to participate in the gallop and rode Parsons Pistol. Something like that would have added a slightly different perspective to the occasion and I"m really looking forward to the racing over Easter. It always produces a great atmosphere and the big crowds each day add enormously to the whole event. It"s also likely that Nicanor will now run in a hurdle race at Fairyhouse instead of a chase and that he will go novice chasing next season. We also have Toofarback in the Irish National. The modification of the whip rule in England last week will certainly tighten things up, the authorities have decreed that the maximum number of times the whip can be used in a race is 16. I"m not sure how they"re going to implement that, but it will curtail its use. While it won"t apply here, I"m sure we will monitor progress. One of the benefits of this whole whip debate is that jockeyship has most definitely improved. The jockeys we have today are better riders because of the whip rules, it"s not acceptable now to knock a horse around as much as was the case in the past. The day of the butcher is gone and it"s better for everyone involved in racing. I"m not in favour of curtailing the whip too much more, but it"s right to mind the horse and the rules that apply here now have been a big help to everyone. The whip is now the last resort and not the first choice. There"s no point in hitting a horse that has no chance in a race and the whip rules are a good idea. There is a lot of influence from non-racing people in this particular aspect of racing, more so in England than here, and especially with some media commentators. That gives me a chance to mention John McCririck again, he tends to rant about things he doesn"t understand. I actually wrote a letter to the Racing Post about him and the overall coverage of the Cheltenham Festival by Channel 4, I mentioned it in this column a few weeks ago. I received a lot of support after the letter was published. I still feel strongly about it and I suggested, in my letter, that one of the presenters didn"t know too much about horses, trainers or jockeys and might be better off in something like The Simpsons. Looking forward to Punchestown at the end of April, Harchibald will be aimed at the big hurdle race again, it"s likely that he will run on the flat before that. 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