Slow Motion

True Motion, considering her race rust and a bloating of 20kg, did reasonably well to come sixth by a narrow margin yesterday. Ultimately, this was a big wall to overcome, especially as an 8kg gain was the most any of the other horses had to deal with, and most were a lot trimmer than they'd been in their previous outings. Add in the fact that the jockey complained the back-end wasn't race-ready, and sixth (0.8 seconds down on the winner) seems lucky on paper. However, she needs to do significantly better if she is to make the cut. If this was a warm-up for a more serious entry in the next few weeks, fair enough. But if that was the best the trainer can do, that's another one gone...

On a happier note, River Spirit will be making her debut in the UK on Monday, racing at Bath in the CB Security Fillies Maiden Auction Stakes. Sam Hitchcott is in the saddle, and I'm really looking forward to seeing the result. Meanwhile, we've two runners in Japan today - let's see if they can impress.

Weekend Joggers

There are three Carrot Club horses running at the weekend: True Motion is in the Tokyo 4R on the 26th (1800m turf with Tanabe-san at the controls); Irish Harp tackles the 2R at Kyoto (a dirt race with Kenichi Ikezoe in the saddle), and Belle Plage is in the 6R at Fukushima (1200m turf with Yoshida-san as her partner in crime.

Further down the line, Single Cask has been booked for the 1000m turf sprint at Niigata on the 4th May, while Mephisto Waltz is going to try a 2400m turf run on the following weekend. These last two entries will either work beautifully or be a complete disaster, but at least something different is being tried.

British Update

With any luck, River Spirit will make her debut at Bath on the 28th, which should be rather exciting, as she's a very willing horse. If she can use that good nature and natural speed of hers to the full, who knows? Fingers crossed for all involved, that's for sure.

Not sure what's happening with Godiva's Pride right now, as a few problems along the way have delayed his debut on several occasions. Okay, so I've had a horse I've named in training at Newmarket, but the dream is not complete. However, with the missus bending my ear over budgets, it puts me in an awkward situation on the future. We'll have to see how things pan out over the next few weeks.

Golden Weekend

The weekend was spent at Tomisato competing in the 2014 Japan Cup. Louis missed out on the A3 Dressage gold by just 0.218% on Saturday, but claimed silver anyway with 59.238. On Sunday, 'Orion' was dead against going into the arena (on the opposite side to normal), and I was within a few seconds of calling it a day when some fresh grass distracted him enough to get through the gateway! After that, he was still pretty wild and spooky, but Louis put in the performance of his life to score 61.303, beating his rival from the day before - an experienced gentleman riding one of the best horses in the country - by almost 4%. Louis has certainly found his calling.

Sophie teamed up with 'Jaguar' to take gold in her dressage category, scoring a creditable 53.166. This was superb given a complete lack of practice and the condition of 'Jaguar' just before the event. He seems to get really stressed out at Tomisato, but Megumi worked some magic with a hose pipe and away he went like a trooper. On Sunday, he was far more up for it, and gave Sophie a blue ribbon (gold) in the Gymkhana Grand Prix, as well as another blue ribbon for myself, the missus and Sophie in the team event. It was a great shame that the Tachibana family couldn't take part with Momo-chan succumbing to a heavy fever, but it's something to look forward to next year, or in a Tokoro internal competition.

One other piece of news for the time being: War Chronicle has passed her checks and is ready to go to the Shikato Stables at Miho Training Centre.