Prix Urban Sea, Friday 13 June

Zaskar runs in the listed race, the Prix Urban Sea, for 3yo fillies at Le Lion D'Angers tomorrow, Friday. The race is due off at 4.05 pm local time and is over 1m 3f 110 yrds. This is the same race that Shawhill came second in last year. There are just nine runners and she must have a decent chance. She is now rated 82 having gone up 11 lbs for her win last time out. The highest rated horse running against her tomorrow is Without Precedent, at 88.

Michaela left with Zaskar last night and they arrived at Florent Monnier's yard about 10.00am this morning. The weather there is similar to here with some light rain. Zaskar will appreciate some give in the ground.

The owners Peter Deal and Michael Silver and their wives/ partners together with Tom and his good friend Stewart Little fly over tomorrow morning.

Melbourne Cup or Breeders Cup?

I haven't been to an overseas meeting for a while but I think a trip this year would be fun. I guess the ultimate would be the Melbourne Cup and maybe I should be thinking about going down under via Las Vegas but I'm not sure if that's possible?

I'll have to wait and see how Shawhill has developed since last year. She is a tough filly finishing stakes placed after being claimed. A long distance handicap might be the type of race that she would appreciate. But I'm not sure she is a Cup horse but wouldn't it be exciting if
she was? I have to admit to not even knowing what official rating you would need to get in the handicap, I will look it up!

I went to the Breeders Cup when it was in Texas at Lone Star Park. What a fantastic trip.

It was my mate ‘Each Way Thief’s’ (nicknames used to protect the innocent!) big birthday and we decided to have a group bet on a horse that he had been following for a few months. The concept was quite straight forward; a few hundred each on Something Exciting at Newmarket. If it won we would go to the Breeders Cup and then on to Vegas for a long weekend. If it lost; no
birthday, no present!

Something Exciting had read the script and won carrying our money at 9s (SP 8's). Tickets for United out of Gatwick via Dallas were purchased and hotel rooms booked.

We flew out the Friday lunch time arriving rather worse for wear after consuming red wine, beer and champagne, most of which had been kindly donated by the air stewardesses. I’ve never really understood why they suggested hiring a car on arrival!

A short taxi journey to the ‘Breeders Cup’ Hotel meant we arrived in time to have a wash a couple of cocktails and then the biggest steaks I had ever seen. Plenty of red wine chosen by the third member of the team (Jeremy doesn’t have a nickname as far as I know but for the purpose of this story let’s call him the China Man. He’ll understand.). Then after dinner we had a couple
of beers and to bed.

None of us had anticipated that the vastness of the steaks would prohibit sleep, so it was a bit of a surprise to all of us that we spent the next five hours betting on racing from Hong Kong and watching it on one of the satellite channels.

6am seemed to arrive very quickly so an early Champagne breakfast was taken.

Unsurprisingly the early start and the fear of long queues meant we jumped in a taxi and headed to Lone Star Park arriving before the gates had officially opened. The early arrival meant we were able to quickly ascertain that our plan of buying tickets for each of the enclosures on Ebay and then selling them when we arrived was kaput. I have never ever seen so many ticket touts and spare tickets on sale anywhere, even a at Spice Girls concert!

So with ‘extras’ lining our pockets we made our way into the track.

By arriving so early we ‘mistakenly’ made our way into the owners enclosure. Not surprisingly once we realised that food was free, the view was the best and the access to the paddock second to none we never actually got around to using or seats.

The day went well but in a haze of beer, pastrami sandwiches and betting slips. I don't think we backed any of the European winners but still managed to end up level even after taking into consideration all our expenditure, mainly on tickets.

Part 2 soon, if you can stand it!

A busy week and another run for Savile's Delight

This week has been really busy at Oneway and my office. The first quarter of the year always generates new business opportunities and this year has been no different. Hopefully a few will come off and new business deals will be struck. This year might see a rapid deceleration in the marketing sector and, if it does, we need to be more protected against the credit crunch hangover. (Tom would also like to have a few more clients so please give him a call if you are interested in a horse or share).

The job at Oneway is not so different. 2006 was a great start with a handful of two-year-olds and older horses giving the stable a good start. 2007 was a brilliant continuation but with a slightly different profile of two-year-olds, a few older horses and only Ishi Adiva and Shawhill
in the three-year-old age group. This year Oneway has more two-year-olds, mostly bought by Tom at the sales last autumn, a few older horses and for the first time a handful of the classic generation.

Of course the most exciting of the three-year-olds, on paper, is Max One Two Three, the winner of the Rockingham Stakes at York. As Andrew Black (Bert) has hinted to on his blog we will be aiming her at the 1000 Guineas at Newmarket. We might be trying to bite off more than we can chew but we will give it a go. Her form is good. A line through Rosa Grace her conqueror at Newbury (which Tom blames himself for!) would have seen her running in the first four in the Dubai 1000 Guineas run at Nad Al Sheba last week.

Apart from Max, Tom also has Clifton Dancer a nursery winner, Zaskar a dual winner last season, Parisian Gift a winner at Lingfield this winter and Gross Prophet a multiple winner and a seriously consistent type. There are also a couple of others that we will discuss over the next few weeks.

The reason I mention this is that the older horses are very well and seriously fresh at the moment! Tom is definitely getting his hands dirty both in and out of the saddle! Let's just say that Clifton Dancer one of the most passive horses of all-time has decided to 'drop' his rider on each visit to the gallops. This was previously unheard of I'm not even sure that she got this excited when she was being broken in!

Add the well being of the classic generation and older horses to the frisky two-year-olds and I'm sure that Alton Towers would be considered a breeze! Let's just hope that everyone and all the horses stay in one piece.

I'm guessing that it could also have a lot to do with the very mild temperatures that we are having this year. In our garden the daffodils are already out (my wife says that they aren't the winter type), the catkins are on the trees and the birds are in full song at 6.20 in the morning. I
imagine the horses also think it's spring, let's just hope we aren't surprised by a long cold snap. I remember when Sheikh Mohammed took some of his two-year-olds to Dubai to winter for the first we all thought that they would have a massive advantage on their return because they would be more forward in their coats etc. Well I think 'nature' may well be trying to even this out.....but that's definitely not a good thing!

Today Savile's Delight runs at Southwell. His last two visits to the track have produced wins over the minimum distance. I would hope for the same result today. His run at Wolverhampton on Monday was rather disappointing. There seems to have been lots of comments about the distance but I personally don't think 7 furlongs is out of his range. He has, of course, previously run and won over 7f even beating horses such as Fonthill Road. In the blog at the weekend Tom mentioned that he was concerned about coming round the home turn with a wall of horses in front, which was absolutely the case. As such the draw, losing a shoe and a bit of indecision probably cost him the race and so it's best to move on. Today would be a great opportunity to do just that.

Of course there are a couple of other beasts in the race and the most likely 'second' would be Spoof Master ridden by Tom’s good friend Jim Crowley. Jim is having a magnificent time of it on the flat and fully deserves to be 5th in the AW Jockey's Championship. Let's just hope he doesn't add another winner to his tally in the 3.50 at Southwell.

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