Catch Up

It's been a fairly quiet last few days for us, considering the amount of racing that's been on, and it's not been too kind to us, with a loss of 7.5pts since our last update.

Nothing too serious though, and a nice winner tonight has hopefully put things back on an upward projection as we look to finish April strongly.

Let's start with Saturday, where we had:

TIME COURSE SELECTION 1pt/2pt win Bookmaker(s) / Price(s)

2.20 Hay Crosby Jemma 1pt 8-1 B365, 7s other BOG

3.30 Hay Kealshore Boy 1pt 9-2 B365, VC, Betfred

3.55 Carl Leac An Scail 1pt 7-1 W Hill

A very disappointing set of performances, with Crosby Jemma in particular never in it. Kealshore Boy jumped very poorly and ended lame in the end and could be winning on another day, while Leac An Scail showed up for around half the race but then faded out of it.

On Easter Sunday we had:

TIME COURSE SELECTION 1pt/2pt win Bookmaker(s) / Price(s)

3.05 Muss Apache Ridge 2pt 20-1 P Power, Lads, W Hill

With a 5furlong handicap it's always likely of course that there'll be the odd hard luck story, and while we wouldn't like to claim that Apache Ridge was likely to win, he certainly wasn't helped by being checked in running twice, once severely, just as he was making his move. Interesting that neither the RP write up ("always towards rear"), nor the Sporting Life write up ("chased leaders, under pressure halfway, soon lost place" deemed to give it a mention. Perhaps one to look out for at a decent price next time.

On to Bank Holiday Monday and we had:

TIME COURSE SELECTION 1pt/2pt win Bookmaker(s) / Price(s)

2.50 Hunt Fit to Drive 2pts 10-1 B365, PP, Betfred

3.25 Hunt Lady Florence 1pt 5-1 W Hill, VC Bet, Betfred

3.45 Redcar Chambers 2pt 12-1 W Hill, Betfred

The 12/1 about Fit to Drive we put up didn't last very long so we'll mark him down as a 10/1 selection. Despite continuing to be supported into 8/1 he ran quite poorly, fading out of things as things began to get serious.

Lady Florence was supported into 5/2 and tried to make all, but couldn't, dropping through the field when headed.

Chambers ran quite well for a long time but lost the lead with around a furlong to go and then weakened.

And then on to today we had:

TIME COURSE SELECTION 1pt/2pt win Bookmaker(s) / Price(s)

3.40 Yarmouth Dazzling Valentine 1pt 9/2 Lads/VC/Boylesport

6.10 Sedgefield Morning Time 2pt 12/1 Bet365/Boylesports/VC/Paddy Power

7.15 Sedgefield Simply Smashing 1pt 5/1 Hills/Lads/Betfred/VC

Dazzling Valentine was caught up on the rail but possibly didn't stay the 10furlong trip at Yarmouth, finishing last of the six runners in the end, after being backed into 7/2.

Morning Time was very well backed into 7/1, and things looked promising for a while, particularly with a couple of fences left to jump, but things didn't work out and he ended up 6th.

And so it was with Simply Smashing, who ironically was our first selection to drift to SP since Saturday, and was the one that won. A really gutsy front running effort, despite continually jumping right the 11yo powered home to win the "Durham National" by a fairly wide margin. Without the jumping errors he would have won by a country mile, a great performance, and returning at 11/2 meant that we got an extra 0.5pts in our pockets.

Confirmation of results with prices (advised --- SP):

Saturday April 23rd:

Crosby Jemma, PU/8, 8/1 --- 13/2

Kealshore Boy, PU/7, 9/2 --- 9/2

Leac An Scale, 6th/8, 7/1 --- 6/1

Sunday April 24th:

Apache Ridge, 8th/11, 20/1 --- 16/1

Monday April 25th:

Fit to Drive, 5th/6, 10/1 --- 8/1

Lady Florence, 5th/7, 5/1 --- 5/2

Chambers 8th/13, 12/1 --- 12/1

Tuesday April 26th:

Dazzling Valentune, 6th/6 9/2 --- 7/2

Morning Time, 6th/11, 12/1 --- 7/1

Simply Smashing, 1st/8, 5/1 --- 11/2

So not a brilliant few days, but no great disaster either, and we look forward to building on Simply Smashing's result before the month is out to further add to April's profits.