24th November - Race reviews

Buffalo Bob ran a cracking race at Newbury – exactly as I expected him to do.
He set off from the front and his quick, accurate jumping, soon had many of the field in trouble.
I said yesterday, that to beat him, one of his rivals was likely to need to have about 10b in hand of the handicapper. Unfortunately, two them had about 20lb in hand !!
That ‘lldoboy and Zarrafakt cruised along side him at the third last and though he kept on battling, they were way too good for him.
That is always the risk in a race such as that, but I can have no complaints about the performance of Bob – nor his rookie jockey, who didn’t seem to put a foot wrong.
To his enormous credit, Bob kept on battling and finished an honourable third – 10 lengths clear of the fourth placed horse.
At the end of the day, if it was always as easy to double your money, I don’t think I’d have too many complaints…

At Taunton, Thunder Child ran a very disappointing race.
He travelled fine for the first 2 miles but then came under pressure and found nothing.
However, his performance in the race, was nothing compared to his performance in the market !
I rejected him at 15/2 last night and was therefore shocked to see him a best priced 7/2 this morning ! Evening more shocking was that he went off at 8/1 !!
They say money talks – but if that’s the case, I’ve no idea what it was saying !
All this said, I do think Thunder Child remains one to keep a careful eye on…
The race went to one of the nominated dangers, Mr Chow, who was making his fencing debut but jumped like an old hand. I suspect he will be out again very soon in an attempt to follow up before he is re-assessed!!

Also from the Pipe yard, Grands Crus continued his march to the very top with a smooth victory in a decent novice chase at Newbury.
His jumping was more severely tested today than it had been at Cheltenham but once again, there was no semblance of a mistake.
Mark my words, this is a very, very good horse – and I’m quite happy with my 33/1 voucher about him for this seasons Cheltenham Gold cup…