Today’s best bets, by Chris Cook
This week will bring the launch of the Racecourse Association’s Showcase & Awards for 2017, designed to highlight the good things achieved by Britain’s racecourses while encouraging all tracks to learn from their rivals and copy their successes. I was on the panel of judges for the first time last year and have signed up to do it again.
I was struck by the effort made by some courses to impress the judges, with pages and pages of well thought-out submissions, and it certainly seemed in some cases that that reflected the effort made by the track to impress its customers and give them a memorable experience. I learned a lot that would otherwise have sailed below my radar and was especially taken with Pontefract’s ‘Art Of Racing’ raceday and by this charitable effort by staff at Cheltenham racecourse.
The awards have been going in their present form since 2011 and now appear to have caught the attention of most tracks and racecourse groups, with the result that the Showcase event was highly commended at the European Association Awards in Brussels early this year. Yes, I realise that having awards for awards nights is a bit circular. No, I didn’t get an invite to that one...
The great hope about Showcase is that it encourages racecourses to keep improving and to keep learning from what others are doing. The entries are not secret but are sent out to all other racecourses, in the hope that best practice standards can be quickly adopted elsewhere. I gather staff at one major track have a full day set aside to pore over the entries submitted by others in case there’s a good idea that can usefully be pinched.
The England & Wales Cricket Board is apparently among the other sporting bodies whose interest has been piqued by the Showcase system and they are now in regular contact with the Racecourse Association, so you may see a similar approach being adopted in county cricket.
Anyway, let me know about your own racecourse experiences through the comments section below, today or on any other day when you have a view that you want to get across. Which tracks do well, in your view, and which need to do better?
Yarmouth plays host to today’s nap, Albert Boy (3.20), an even-money shot for a middle-distance handicap. Having been rated 71 in the middle of last year, he dropped all the way to 55, a mark he has been exploiting this spring, with two wins from his last three starts. I have the impression that he struck for home rather a long way out on a testing surface on the only occasion he was beaten last month.
Anyway, he gets to run today from the same mark as when winning an apprentice race by five lengths just eight days ago. He comes from the Scott Dixon yard that seems to be doing well just now.
Knight Destroyer (5.30) is another popular pick, being just 5-4 for the last at Chepstow. This Jonjo O’Neill three-year-old took a big step forward when second on his handicap debut here last month, his first outing since being gelded in September. He ran on well but too late that day after a brief bit of traffic trouble and hopefully will get a clearer run in this smaller field on softer ground.
Balancing out these two obvious ones is Hitman (4.10), who appears friendless at 33-1 for a mile handicap at Wetherby. He’s only 3lb higher than when winning a Newbury handicap for William Muir last summer and, although that was followed by a couple of lifeless efforts, it doesn’t require a great deal of imagination to see him returning to his early form of last year, now that he’s had a break, been gelded and joined a new trainer in Rebecca Bastiman, who’s had a couple of recent winners.
Tuesday racing tips
Chepstow
2.00 So Hi Society 2.30 Pick A Little 3.00 Tis Wonderful 3.30 Englishman 4.00 Miss Inga Sock 4.30 Hawridge Flyer 5.00 Lexington Law 5.30 Knight Destroyer (nb)
Wetherby
2.10 Dontgiveuponbob 2.40 Rampant Lion 3.10 Casaclare 3.40 Miss Ranger 4.10 Hitman 4.40 Merlin 5.10 War Of Succession 5.40 Saint Thomas
Yarmouth
2.20 Immortal Romance 2.50 Addeybb 3.20 Albert Boy (nap) 3.50 Street Art 4.20 Thaqaffa 4.50 Break The Silence 5.20 Envisaging
Fontwell
5.50 Dites Rien 6.20 Black Corton 6.50 Tempestatefloresco 7.20 Highbury High 7.50 Blue Rhythm 8.20 Day Of Roses 8.50 Represented
Southwell
6.05 Code Of Law 6.35 HonkyTonktennessee 7.05 Monbeg Legend 7.35 I’ll Be Your Clown 8.05 Miss Maiden Over 8.35 Ashoka 9.05 Tell It To Me
