Jackknife... closest ive come to drawing all week... I dont think it would have beaten the winner... Anyone noticed how much these ex Sir Michael Stoute horses are improving... in fairness to him, he's got some group horses good handicap marks...!!
Proper fast flat racing ground; five favourites going in for the punters, giving the bookies a right caning; the Ascot Gold Cup won in record time by a proper old stayer: what a day at Royal Ascot. With a horse called Trawlerman winning the Gold Cup, there must have been queues a mile long at the payout in the betting shops of Hull, once one of the two largest fishing ports in the World. I bet I am the only person in Hull that managed to lose today... Charles Darwin did not win as easily as some would have expected in the Norfolk, but a winner is a winner. Will he try to win the Nunthorpe? If he did then who gets the ride as Ryan surely cannot do the weight without a limb amputation. The Coolmore bandwagon continued in the Ribblesdale with Garden Of Eden leading home the least experienced and longest-priced of the Gosden trio, Understudy (an ironic name for a second), in what did not look an especially strong renewal and might just have contained a couple of good improving fillies. The Gosdens did not have to wait long for retribution as William Buick gave Trawlerman a masterful ride from the front to see off Illinois in tremendous fashion in the feature. My selection came completely unstuck in the Hampton Court, trailing in last after being hampered, as it was once again Ryan Moore’s turn to win from the front on Trinity College who switched setting the fractions for a stablemate to setting them just for himself.
