Dry As A Desert

Courtesy JLH Racing

Talk about dry spells. Irish Harp started well, fighting for second or third with two furlongs to go, but the gas ran out, and she fell back to a very disappointing tenth. Time to retire? No good in Oz either, although to be fair 'Rosie' (pictured) did start as rank outsider, which shows she was in a class field - having the gap she was going for closed didn't help either. There's another race coming up soon, at least, which is the difference - in England and Australia, you keep them racing until you get a result (as long as the horse is fit) or confirm you've got a no-hoper, whereas JRA trainers run them once in a blue moon and then have the cheek to blame race rust for the kind of bad performance one expects from a horse that hasn't ran for a while!

PS. The trainer report clarifies the jockey's statement that Irish Harp was pulling to the right, and Tanaka feels this cost us a top five finish. Sounds fair to me, and I'm no big fan of Tanaka after the Tenshinramman disaster. But what's not fair is the trainer saying it was his first run with the horse and you can put it down to experience. I'm sorry, but five minutes watching a horse in training can tell you it pulls to the right - after three months away from the track, there's been plenty of time for a faultless preparation, with race rust being the only problem that could or should be an issue. It's no good having paper qualifications galore if you can't pick up simple things that a decent stablehand would spot with ease. Typical JRA! Now, what you should do - with experience in the bag - is race the horse on an anti-clockwise track (like Nakayama) within the next two weeks at the most. But no, it will go a training centre (or, worse still, what amounts to a holiday camp), away from the racing stables, and once again the communication and hands-on fine-tuning needed won't be there. Even if the trainer did decide to race, the chances of finding a suitable berth in a gate in JRA racing is remote, and almost impossible to find one on the right track over the right surface and distance - nowhere near enough meetings, hence the long holidays, hence the poor preparation, hence the bad result, hence another pointless holiday, and the cycle goes on... Pathetic.

More Dates

Blacklister raced in the 12:10 at Lingfield today, keeping the UK campaign in motion, but sadly couldn't deliver the goods (a race is booked for the 23rd, too, so hopefully we can get some revenge then), and War Chronicle has been pencilled in for the 20th at NAR's Nagoya track. It's a class field in the 1600m 10R, and - of course - we have the outside gate! This will be a test for War Chronicle...

Pretty Gully should be out in Australia at the same time as Irish Harp tackles JRA's Tokyo track - I'm hoping the jockey can prove me wrong on my opinion of him in the sixth race on the 21st. Two days later, the fifth race at Kochi is my annual support race for the track, and in the evening Pop Label teams up with Mori-kun in the TCK 11R. Still with TCK, Beat The Boarder runs in the 6R on the 27th. At least we've got a few out and about.

PS. A rough start for War Chronicle finished her chance against the firm favourite (betting at evens!), but a strong second at least put a few pennies in the bank. The only problem is its a bad result as far as her career goes - another win was needed to put her back in JRA racing. I guess she could always stay in NAR, which would suit me anyway.

Satisfying Sunday

I've not written much on the dressage front recently, which doesn't mean the pace has slowed down - it most certainly hasn't! I was ill for quite some time, with my body throwing in the towel after doing way too much work without a break as usual, but the kids have had a very busy schedule, with one training clinic after another. Today, Miyaki-sensei taught Sophie and 'Bugatti' a few tricks in the morning, with Louis borrowing a Colza horse for the afternoon.

On the race side, Rush Attack was a mildly-disappointing seventh. After what seemed like a good start, Katsuura-san allowed others to push him from one bad position into another most of the way round, although a gate closer to the rail would've probably helped his cause.

However, Larressingle ran a most pleasing race. The start was disgusting, as sometimes happens with a youngster, but the way she stormed around the track after that - beaten only by the favourite (who started from gate one and just had to hold on) and the second favourite - was a sight to see. My faith in this particular trainer has been rewarded as far as I'm concerned, and the future looks bright with this one. Today's third place is just the beginning!