12th January - Race reviews

Penn Da Benn ran a fair race this afternoon – but simply wasn’t in the class of the 2 others in the race.
To be fair, time might show that to be a pretty smart class: Carpincho never put a foot wrong as he lead from pillar to post; whilst Sherwani Wolf also ran well and was trying to mount a challenge when he blundered badly at the last.
Penn Da Benn is not slick enough at the fences to ever reach the heights that he did over hurdles, but if he is dropped from his current mark of 116, I think there could be a small race in him – though ideally it would be over hurdles…

As expected, Marodima blazed off in front in the handicap chase. However, what I didn’t expect was for him to just keep going further and further clear…
At his peak, he would have been entitled to destroy today’s’ opposition by over 50 lengths. But his peak seemed to be a long time ago and it would have taken something of an act of faith to support him to put up the performance he did today.
I might have been half tempted if his SP of 5/1 had been available yesterday evening – but his price then was closer to 5/2, which held very little appeal.
Pocket Aces seemed to be travelling quite comfortably behind, in third place. But is soon became apparent that neither he nor any of Marodima’s other rivals, were going to get within hailing distance.
Pocket Aces was eventually pulled up on the run to the final fence. He did look tired but as he was still in third place at the time, it seemed a slightly odd thing to do.
He could have been injured I guess, but I suspect the jockey was simply trying to avoid bottoming him for very little reward.
He may just warrant a watching brief next time.

Finally, at Catterick, Lucky Landing ran a very similar race to the last twice.
Even over the quick 2 miles, he was able to travel comfortably and looked the most likely winner as the runners went down the back straight.
However, once again, he emptied in a matter of strides, when the pressure was applied.
Initially I thought it must be a breathing issue – but apparently he bled from the nose. Whatever the reason, he simply can’t be supported until it is proved that connections have managed to cure his physical problems.

There will be no tips tomorrow – and with colder weather on the horizon the weekend fixtures must be in some doubt. Hopefully they will survive any freezing temperatures as the cards at both Kempton and Warwick look potentially interesting…