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Red Verdon Makes His Racecourse Return

Sun 31 March 2019

Good Morning from Newmarket. We are 24 hours late to the party for the start of the grass season, but we head to Doncaster today with three runners.

We kick off with our stable flag bearer Red Verdon in the mile and a half conditions race at 3.45. It has been well documented that the horse suffered a rather difficult time on his travels towards the end of last year, enduring plenty of bad luck in Australia and Hong Kong. He returned home a little battered and bruised, but was given a short break and appears to have bounced back to his old self now.

Rated 110, a Listed winner and placed on numerous occasions in pattern races all the way up to the highest level, this conditions race looks a good place to start his six-year-old campaign. He is well served by the terms of the race, the trip, track and ground should hold no fears, and he is just about ready to start off. We also gelded him during the winter, and it remains to be seen whether or not that procedure can unlock some further improvement.

I am under no illusions that he will improve significantly for the run from a fitness perspective, and I realise that Willie John is an extremely highly-regarded horse who will take a lot of beating. Add into the mix the smart pair Sir Chauvelin and Crowned Eagle, and suddenly this race begins to look quite tricky. What I am hoping for, however, is a sign that Red Verdon retains his ability following his travails towards the end of last season, and if he does then he really should not be far away. Ryan Moore rides

Later, in the 4.55, Venedegar is unleashed for his first start of the year. A talented performer in novice company last season, the three-year-old son of Dubawi ran into several smart animals and was perhaps unlucky not to win. He could be quite colty and it appeared as though his mind was on other things, so he is another that has been gelded during the close season.

It remains to be seen whether or not his mark of 82 is workable, and he is not the biggest horse, so how well he will train on is somewhat open to question. What I can say is that his work has been pleasing us of late, he looks to have strengthened up considerably, and he is from a good family. This is a typically competitive renewal of this mile and a quarter handicap but, with Ryan Moore booked, we keep our fingers crossed that he can give a good account.

Our final runner is Grandscape in the mile and a half amateur riders handicap at 5.30. He will be ridden by Sophie Smith, who developed a great rapport with the horse in four spins together in the second half of last season, and hopefully they will get on equally well this year. Grandscape embarks on his four-year-old campaign rated  71 - which he can hopefully compete from -  and this sort of test ought to be right up his street. It is possible that the ground will be a touch faster than he ideally wants it, and he will certainly benefit from the run from a fitness perspective, but I hope that we will see a good performance nonetheless.

So to conclude, we have three runners, all with some sort of a chance on paper, but all likely to improve for the run too. Hopefully we will see some positive signs with our first runners of the year on turf, but on a day as competitive as this it is impossible to be any more than hopeful. 



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