East Coast Setback

Lillyput and Ettie Hart both struggled at Yarmouth on Thursday. Looking at the race videos, both ran hard early on, although the jockeys gave up a furlong or so out when it was clear that they'd been outclassed on the day - at least that's better than simply running out of steam, which is what has been happening with the Japanese nags. The other difference, of course, is that they'll both be back to fight another day very soon instead of once a month (if you're incredibly lucky) or, as is often the case, once a bloody season.

The next race for us now is Masterson at Ripon, and then we have one in Japan as it happens, with Larressingle racing at Sapporo on Sunday. It's a shame that this is probably the best Carrot horse we have (most are now junk, either from being ruined somehow or not really good in the first place but lucky on the day, so they get kept as a 'winner'), but if it doesn't win this time out, it will almost certainly have to go. Let's see what happens with Kosei Miura at the helm.

PS. Vertice has landed at TCK, but it still has tests to do, so it will be some time before we know what we have on the books. Meanwhile, Kealoha is now back at Funabashi, and Magic Key should be returning there soon. Progress, at least, as both need to start earning their keep (Magic Key, in particular, as this was another ridiculously expensive nag) and then some to help start covering Another Door's bill as well, as it doesn't look as if the latter will be able to contribute earnings by itself. Together, these three horses add up to a 42,000,000 yen catalogue price - from what I've seen so far, their true combined value would be closer to 10,000,000 yen at the very most. Kealoha was the cheapest of the three, yet, with 2,400,000 yen in earnings, it has brought in 20% more than the other two between them. Even that, though, doesn't cover much more than half a year of running costs on one NAR horse, so you can see why the catalogue values desperately need a long-overdue reality check if NAR is to survive beyond the short-term thinking of the Shadai organisation, brought on by greed. If everyone stopped buying for just one year, that much-needed downward adjustment would happen, but as long as people keep paying silly money out in the knowledge that there's virtually no chance of ever seeing any kind of return, nothing will change until NAR ceases to exist.