Dark Red
The first day of the Turf is upon us and after 2mm of rain this morning the ground at Doncaster will be soft. The rain should be helpful as without it the ground could have ridden dead and tacky. It has been mainly dry here and we have had a much better week with the weather. There is a lot of rain forecast next week unfortunately, especially on Tuesday and we may get some snow later in the week too.
King Kevin ran another solid race when second at Chelmsford on Thursday. He was running wrong at the weights and he could have done with a stronger gallop over ten furlongs but he tried hard and has been a fantastic flagbearer for us over the Winter.
We have three runners today at Doncaster and Wolverhampton. Apex King runs in the Spring Mile at 2:25 and is sporting blinkers for the first time. He never got involved at Chelmsford on his seasonal reappearance and I felt that a pair of blinkers will sharpen him up. On his two year old form he is well handicapped and he will enjoy the soft ground here but it is a very competitive race and I just hope he shows us some spark. If Sir Roderic can rediscover his form after a wind op he is a very well handicapped horse, Taqdeer could be anything but he returns from a long break. Whats The Story and Original Choice are two that showed a good level of form last year and still have improvement in them and many more have claims.
Dark Red has his ground at Doncaster and should come on for his seasonal reappearance. I have put the blinkers back on as he won in them at York and then ran extremely well at Ascot over the mile in the Balmoral. We don’t know what the best draw will be but there appears to be some pace just outside of him and I hope he can get a good tow into the race. We are vulnerable to improvers as he does not hold many secrets from the handicapper but he is in terrific form at home and he has the benefit of having a run under his belt. Our old rival Lord Glitters will enjoy conditions too but we are weighted to be close to him on the Balmoral form. Fire Brigade and Addeybb are the talking horses that potentially have plenty more improvement in them and Big Country showed he could cope with a mile when winning the Lincoln Trial. It’s a fiercely competitive handicap and one that is always very difficult to win but it’s lovely to have a horse with a chance in the race and I hope he runs well.
Global Art is our final runner this evening at Wolverhampton. Blackheath and Ateem set the standard so far and both have an official rating of 79. Ateem showed the most promise but did not look straightforward whilst Blackheath ran his best race in handicap company over 6f and is bred to improve for the step up in trip. Faadhel could well improve but needs to on his third start and Sounds Approving was well supported on debut so there could be more to come from him. Global Art is a nice horse who ran green on his debut at Ascot and ran respectably in what looked like a good race. He will improve on what he does today but I hope he will run well.