Schooling them up

It was a great start to the week on Monday when The Ducking Stool was out again after recently breaking her maiden tag to gallop home a gallant 2nd, it was testing ground and the winner hacked up so it was another impressive performance and the win seemed to do her confidence the world of good. She is entered again at Newcastle on Thursday. The only other runner of the week was Attain at Goodwood on Friday, he finished down the field but they crawled round and then sprinted for home which did not suit him, he also came in with a cut on his hind leg and he lost a front shoe which wouldn't of helped his cause.

For only a few times this week the sun shone and luckily it was when the camera was out! Here we have two sweet fillies Entrance (behind) and Kampai working on the Peat Moss, they're both ready to run now, especially as Kampai is over a slight viral infection. There are a couple of races for Entrance at the beginning of next month provided the ground dries out a bit.

Sail Home (black cap)  has been in brilliant form since her illustrious winter campaign and bids for another good run at Yarmouth on Thursday, Angel of Mercy was back galloping after coming out of her debut race well and Emma's Gift (grey) was doing her first bit of work after a short lay off and seems to still contain all her enthusiasm for the game.

A filly I have been riding a bit this week is Lea Valley (nearest) she is un-raced and is still very green but once she gets her head down and into her work she has been impressing me with her resolution, she worked along side Canning Vale who is entered up at Yarmouth on Thursday also.

We had a new face join the string on Saturday when my sister Poppy donned the riding boots once again and came out of retirement to ride Sail Home up to the gallops!

One of the new colts recently brought in, Sheila's Heart, has settled in nicely and is doing his work really well, he is still quite colty with the new surroundings but is a  lovely looking horse and should be one to follow this season if all goes well. 

Old stable star Khajaaly is back on the heath now after his leg operation and his recovery seems to be going quicker than we first scheduled, he has just been doing steady canters but still pulls like a train so nothing seems to be bothering him anymore. He was followed up by the un-named Phoenix Reach colt who is quite shy and nervous but is handling the busy heath and work well, shares are still available on the website. 

We had fun today with Silver Alliance and Verona Bay when we took them to the schooling grounds and gave them a pop over a few hurdles. Neither had seen a hurdle before or taken their feet off the ground, so it was amazing when they both took to it like old chasers! Silver was a natural and even started to get a good technique going and got a bit of speed through the air. Verona was a bit more careful and had a good look, he jumped them huge and made sure he looked after himself, but they both thoroughly enjoyed it and gave them something else to think about as well as a change of scenery. We're not thinking about running either of them over jumps anytime soon but it's just nice to do something different with them and use a few muscles they didn't know they had.

Side on view of Silver



Verona not touching a twig!




Upsides over the first




Rear view

With all the action this week the most heart stopping moment came when Black Caviar's jockey stopped riding! It was unbelievable after all the hype and anticipation something has to go wrong. People are constantly comparing her with Frankel even though they run over different distances, but after that performance I think our boy would beat her over what ever distance they wanted in a match race. It was strange this year not going down to Royal Ascot as over the past 3 years or so we've had runners but unfortunately we didn't have anything suitable this year.

Also entered up this week is Omega Omega at Yarmouth on Thursday (busy day!) who goes for her second ever run, she would probably be one to follow when handicapping as she looks to need the experience.