Here was me, looking up at the photo frames that contain all the Japanese winners in my office, and thinking I'd have to shuffle them about a bit to make room for Belle Plage's third and Irish Harp's second win. No problem - each frame holds three pictures, so all I'd have to do is move Irish Harp's one to a new frame shared with Massabielle, and everything is sorted...Well, Irish Harp made a bad start, and although there was a strong finish, the times don't show that, as the young jockey got himself blocked on the run-in. Granted, fifth is a lot better than the 12th recorded by Belle Plage, but finishing a huge 1.4 seconds down on the winner is hardly something to celebrate (even Belle Plage was only 1.2 down at the back of the pack). Race-rust is still a problem as far as I can see, otherwise the start wouldn't have been so painful to watch, and hopefully it will stay at the stables and fight again very soon. As for Belle Plage (pictured here), the start was good, but the rest of the race was basically a half-hearted practice run. Given that she'd been on holiday for so long and was carrying a fair bit of extra weight compared to before, she was probably in too strong a field (all male, virtually all older) for a comeback race. Let's hope she also runs again soon, because, on paper at least, that was an extremely disappointing performance by any standards. Meanwhile, Massabielle has shot off to Northern Farm for a break, but unlike so many of the JRA horses that go on overly-long package holidays up north, he deserves it after that traumatic debut.
No comments:
Post a Comment