Sayesse was entered in the 4:30 at Newbury on Saturday, which is a bit late to stay up JST for an oldie like me, so I got the result and feedback from the race on Sunday morning. Ummm. The poor thing was hampered early on, so the jockey just cruised him home in order to give him a fighting chance next time around. He's given us some wonderful racing this year, though (as has Ettie Hart, his stablemate in the LIR syndicate), so he's allowed to cruise hime as far as I'm concerned, as I know 100% that if there was any chance of finishing well, the horse would be allowed to give his all, and he'd give it willingly.
Next up, a rare JRA entry. Of course, Belle Plage got the outside gate (if I cared as much about Japanese racing as I do English racing, I would ask for an enquiry into how I manage to get so many outside gate draws), which isn't a good way to begin a comeback after an awfully long and almost certainly unwarranted holiday - itself, a handicap of sorts. As such, the odds were awful, even in a race full of supposedly similar level horses. Well, it finished 1.5 seconds off the pace, second from last. Great. Well worth waiting five months for that. Race it next week, now it's shaken off some of the race-rust, or simply retire it!
Pop Label was due to run at TCK on the 25th, but for some reason it's name doesn't appear on the race card. There's nothing up on the Sunday website (probably consulting the book of excuses and struggling to find something they haven't used before), but we can assume the bloody thing is injured yet again! Three years without a win, and still the club is sponging off us. It wouldn't be so bad if it ran often and provided a bit of entertainment, but it has run just six times this year, and provided only two top three finishes - it was 14th in the last outing, which, like Japanese racing a whole, is a bad joke...
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