Daily Racing Thread Saturday 6th. June 2020

High Rise won the Derby trial in a quick time and went on to succeed in the Derby Ron. I tend to rely very little on the Stopwatch but I know of guys who trust it implicitly.

One guy I used to read about on another forum did all his going reports for a meeting based on his own timings for the day. He had a vast database of times for every race at every meeting going back for several years. He once told me that he would be able to handicap a horse based solely on race times.

I have to say I was sceptical about that and the guy blew a top when I expressed my doubts. I decided to leave him to his figures and thoughts but I have to observe that the going given for any particular meeting is often dubious looking and the French Racing in particular seems to vary wildly depending on which source you check. The Racing Post and At The Races often differ by a long way on what the going actually is.

 

Berkshire Rocco went pretty hard early as well, the race fell apart really with the front runners going to fast and English Kings closing 3f isnt that impressive compared to Berkshire Rocco. I think some are getting carried away by the numbers on extremely fast ground, as Grendel said, he ran to around 110, lower than many of the top contenders for the Derby have already achieved, and he done it at a trip, you can argue he appeared to do it easily and guess about how much more he is capable of all out. He looks the part but seems likely to be way overbet for beating Berkshire Rocco a couple of lengths.

 

What we don't know is, if a 120 horse had been in the Derby trial, would it have beaten English King? That would have told us something. I'm speculating that he would have still won. He is still learning the game and come the Derby he may still be, but I think he will run a good race. He has no negatives for me and the only negative put forward so far is that he hasn't yet produced form to match that of a Derby winner. Did Commander In Chief have Derby form before winning? I suspect there are a few that came into the race with a far lower rating than what they achieved in the Derby. I expect him to have a much higher rating after the Derby. Of course I may have egg on my face come Derby Day