Unraced section in good form

It has been a productive few days for the Unraced Three Year Olds section in AOTF with Reminder (4/1) and Ziryab (6/4) winning at Windsor and Leicester respectively at the beginning of the week. The latter, in particular, looks most progressive and has improved with each outing. Trained by John and Thady Gosden, the Kingman colt who cost 525,000gns as a yearling had chased home stablemate Mostabshir at York last time and shed his maiden tag at the third time of asking at the Midlands track on Tuesday. Making all under Ryan Moore, he slipped away from his field inside the final quarter of a mile to run out a comfortable two lengths winner. One wonders whether he may be fast tracked into the Britannia Stakes at Royal Ascot (22nd June) later this month. Either way, he is a nice type who looks capable of winning a decent three year old handicap at least this season.

Twenty four hours later, New Business, who is in the same section, made all in the second division of the seven furlongs novice stakes at Kempton on Wednesday evening. The Sea The Stars colt finished third behind Passenger on his debut in the Wood Ditton Stakes at HQ in April before finishing fourth at York last time - around two and a half lengths behind the aforementioned Ziryab. Given a positive ride by Oisin Murphy, he set a decent tempo and never looked like relinquishing it scoring by a length and a half. Held in highest regard by Andrew Balding, he is one to keep an eye on for the big summer Festivals.

Two winners from the Top 40 last week received hefty rises in the ratings as a result. Burglar was raised seven pounds to a mark of 92 following his cosy success at Redcar, while stablemate Torito who impressed when scoring at Epsom on Derby day is now rated 105 after the assessor gave him a ten pounds hike. Interestingly, the latter has been given an entry in the John Smith's Cup at York (15th July). 

I was working at Wetherby on Tuesday night for their penultimate Flat meeting of the season - their final one takes place next week on Tuesday 13th June. There was a sparse crowd in attendance, which wasn't a surprise given the nature of the card - the highest rated runner during the evening was racing off a mark of 70. However, it is likely the two year old event for fillies over five and a half furlongs wasn't a bad contest. There was plenty of confidence behind the debutant Hot Front who was backed in favouritism. The Paul and Oliver Cole trained runner had reportedly shown a lot of speed at home and she ran accordingly only to be collared late on - expect to see the daughter of Soldier's Call dropped back to the minimum trip next time. The race went the way of the Amy Murphy trained Passionately who had shaped encouragingly on her debut on bottomless ground in France. Bronte Collection owned the Cole trained runner-up and they were also responsible for the fourth home Ninety Nine. A daughter of Dandy Man out of the useful Red Balloons, the Richard Fahey trained filly came from a fair way back and wasn't beaten far. She is one for the notebook.

During the evening I picked up some very interesting information regarding one leading northern trainer's juvenile team for Royal Ascot. That news will be passed on in the AOTF Royal Ascot Update, which is due to be published on Sunday 18th June. Thank you very much to all those clients who have ordered their copy. If you haven't already done so, please head to the Publications section of the site.