The 3m3f handicap hurdle at Sedgefield today will be hard work for horse and rider, but Matmata de Tendron (4.20) and Dougie Costello look equal to the task. A three times course and distance winner over fences here, this proven stayer is currently well handicapped over the smaller obstacles.
Lethal (4.30) gave a good account of himself on the Fibresand at Southwell last week when a close second to his better fancied stable companion Swinbrook. He has good prospects of going one better at the course today, while at Lingfield Oat Cuisine (3.10) does not look overburdened on her first venture into handicap company.
Tony Paley: 2.20pm On The Morning Line recently Jim McGrath said Lingfield was the trickiest course in the country for punters and the opener there just proves how difficult it is with tactics often playing a huge part in so many races. Sophie Doyle has basically ridden the other jocks to sleep on Rosy Dawn, dominating from the front and sprinting home a comfortable winner at 14-1.
3.00pm Incompetence at Lingfield and at Sedgefield now too. Young Irish jockey Robert Dunne is going to get a roasting from his trainer and from the punters after he fails to kick on when in the lead on Dippy Duck in the 2.50 and gets caught by Colditz. The rider on the runner-up failed to escape from Colditz (I'm blaming colleague Chris Cook for that one) because he didn't put his mount under enough pressure when leading and took it far too easy. There will be a lot of unhappy backers of Dippy Duck and they have every right to feel aggrieved. Admittedly, the horse didn't find a lot under pressure but the jockey looked behind twice after the second-last hurdle and eased down which definitely contributed to the defeat.
Does anyone (like me) remember Colditz, the BBC TV series of that name from the 1970s? As a spin-off from the programme Waddington (what memories that name conjures) put out a board game. Chris Cook has just told me of one family Christmas when his grandmother got through the barbed wire and "escaped". His father, who was playing the role of the beastly Germans in charge of the famous prisoner of war camp, proceeded to "shoot" her as a result of which the game had to be abandoned after she broke down in tears and Chris's father was severely admonished.
4.00pm Did you read about Kieren Fallon dating Kirsty Milczarek in the Sun at the weekend? If you didn't click here for details. In typical Sun style when they showed a lingerie shot of Kirsty and fellow young women jockeys Natalia Gemelova and Adele Rothery (all for the benefit of charidee of course) a couple of years ago the headline was Undie Starters Orders.
In the Post today a correspondent was regaling readers with how it has taken 14 years to remove the phrase Under Starter's Orders from usage on the racetrack. Many think it was a shame they stopped it (or attempted to) in 1994. It got me to thinking about what else we've lost. Does anyone, like me, remember when horses were allotted their saddlecloth numbers at the five-day stage and not overnight as now. Horses had numbers like 54, 81 and, in extreme cases, in the hundreds. I miss that. Weatherbys (racing's administrators) tell me it was pre-1990.
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