Hello, troops. Hope old girl Mother Nature isn't causing you too much grief.
Question has to be asked. What did we think of Blaklion on Saturday?!? This time last term it was Colin Tizzard who was baffling me with his Thistlecrack musings but I must confess I still have huge doubts, and concerns, about what the connections of Blaklion achieved on Saturday. Yes, they won £81k as he romped home but seriously they surely ‘lost’ the 2018 Grand National (and a potential £561k) as well with that performances. I think Blaklion will go up around 10 lbs for his win taking him to 163 – which is borderline’ Cheltenham Gold Cup’ class and to win a GN, off that perch, history tells us is nigh on impossible. 153, or lower, and he would have had a great chance, methinks. Bookie chappies cut him from 16/1 to 12/1 for Aintree glory in April but quite frankly I’d have eased him the other way.
Admittedly, the thoroughbred is a very fragile animal and who knows what condition Blaklion will be in come April. I think it must have been a hard call to make on Saturday re whether or not they went for the ‘Becher’ or held back to achieve a more favourable mark (nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more…) but if he’s fit come ‘tapes up’ in the 2018 GN they could regret the additional impost he will carry for Saturday’s win. Unless, and it’s an unless with a huge capital ‘U’. Blaklion is now CGC class (and his new perch is going to put him on the fringes of being so) and 163 is exploitable re him in the GN. Cut to 40’s for that Cheltenham heat incidentally. Could they therefore go CGC and then GN in 2018?!? Any thoughts???
Finally, I’m sure we’ve all made the odd fashion faux pas or two in our time – I, for instance, now realise that wearing that red waistcoat and yellow corduroys was a horrendous mistake. But what did Colin Tizzard think he looked like in that battered old trilby on Saturday?!? There is only one chap, in racing, who can get away with that look and it ain’t you Colin, old boy.
Good luck all.
