Royal Ascot - Friday

I thought de Sousa's performance on Albasharah in the Wolferton on Friday was a shocker. Not because he found trouble in the straight - these things happen - but because of his lack of effort thereafter. Although she went off 3/1f she was widely available at 5/1 in the morning (6 in a place) and there must have been plenty of people on each-way. They must have been spitting blood when they saw the filly fly home into fifth place with the jockey sitting virtually motionless throughout the final 200 yards. She was less than two lengths behind Bana Wu in third.

We see this sort of thing every so often and the stewards seem reluctant to take any sort of action. Queally on Picture Dealer at Doncaster last year and Guillambert on Submission at Goodwood the previous year have been the subject of previous threads on here. My all-time favourite was Johnny Murtagh's ride on Polar Magic at Sandown in 2005. They're all characterised by jockeys reacting to interference by giving up prematurely only for their mounts to fly home with no encouragement from the saddle. It's as much failing to obtain the best position possible as stopping them or easing down prematurely and these incidents shouldn't just be swept under the carpet simply because they're errors of judgement rather than something more sinister.
 
Desert Orchid said:
I was wondering about that at the time. It reminded me of Dahlia's King George when she won by six lengths looking awesome. I think she just took advantage of an overfast pace by being ridden more conservatively out the back.
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Dahlia of course then won the following year by three lengths without coming off the bridle and a hatful of other G1 too - I imagine the Hannons would take her being as good as dahlia !

Cracking effort on Friday off a proper pace true enough but she was electric at the end and Hughes even took a pull two out .
 
clivex said:
Too much made of these pace issues IMO. The winner would have won regardless. It was too comfortable. I wouldn't give a moments consideration to backing one of the beaten against her next time
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There's the rub, Clivex. Do you accept that Sky Lantern has suddenly found c9lbs of improvement, or do you question the circumstances it was achieved in?
Given the Coronation was the fastest run race of the day, the front horses finished out the back, the back horses finished in the front, and the very different trips the principals from the 1,000 Guineas encountered, it's entirely reasonable to suppose pace did make a difference.
Sky Lantern is clearly a classy filly, but the cards very much dropped her way in this, and though she may have improved 3 or 4lbs naturally, I wouldn't be betting on an exact repeat anytime soon.
 
Why question the race? Run at a good pace but it didnt look suicidal to me. Are we saying that every jockey bar one lost their heads?

Its overanalysing in my opinion. Im pretty unconvinced by this regular suggestion on this forum that results would always turn out differently depending on how the race was run. yes if there are small margins perhaps but very sceptical about such dominant perfomances

if we are going back to Dahlia for an example...

She probably has improved a fair bit and that would hardly be unusual for a horse at this stage of career

I think a repeat is more likely than not
 
I don't agree about going back to 4 days - the Albany, the Duke of Cambridge , the Sandringham have all been pluses- the Tercentenary is becoming a very hot race albeit to the detriment of the KEVII but the Wolferton needs work and the Buckingham Palace needs the boot.
 
clivex said:
Why question the race? Run at a good pace but it didnt look suicidal to me. Are we saying that every jockey bar one lost their heads?

Its overanalysing in my opinion. Im pretty unconvinced by this regular suggestion on this forum that results would always turn out differently depending on how the race was run. yes if there are small margins perhaps but very sceptical about such dominant perfomances

if we are going back to Dahlia for an example...

She probably has improved a fair bit and that would hardly be unusual for a horse at this stage of career

I think a repeat is more likely than not
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Have it your own way, Clivex, though 9lb is an inordinate amount for a filly to find, having won a Classic on her previous run. At her supposed rate of progress, she'll be a piece better than Goldikova by her next outing,anyway.
 
Goldi's not a good example to use as she was yet to win a group 1 at this stage of her 3yo season.

Zarkava would have sh!t on both of them though :)
 
Sky Lantern grew and put on 11kg weight between 1000 Gns and Ascot.
Improvement not out of the question. How much more to come is the issue surely.
Fillies more inclined to improve in autumn when not coming into season, thinking of Rose Bowl and Swiss Maid from my youth, to name 2.
Given the lousy Spring maybe the Summer bloom is catching her now.
Having just re read the Dominic Gardiner Hill blog of 1000 Gns he rated her then as not having improved much from 2 to 3yo, rating her 111.
Sunybay has her now at 119p, as near as to 9lb as we need to have confidence in her performance Friday.
Dawn Approach rated 124p and Toronado 123p puts them all very close.
 
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I hear what you're saying, edgt, and I agree with much of it, but improvement of her type is not the great imponderable that many seem to blindly accept. It's not as though she's suddenly learned how to race, was much fitter than she would have been previously, racing over an entirely different distance or surface, or benefited from blinkers or some other artificial aid.
Good, fit, experienced and consistent horses improve at a fairly predictable rate, and Admiral Rous pegged her expectation at 3lbs (notwithstanding that Just The Judge should have shown similar progress) and - working on the premise that nothing happens without a reason - for her to find 9lb (the Oh has it at 8) on her recent Classic win falls well outside any reasonable norm.
Much as Clivex dislikes the idea, the only tenable answer (imo) is that she was flattered by the pace..
 
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Maybe she was Reet, time will tell.
In farming practices there is a concept of "compensatory growth " whereby delayed growth (or improvement, call it what you will) occurs when conditions are favourable evening the score over time so to speak.
If she had not improved through the winter to spring (when expected to in normal circumstances ) she might more than make up for it since.
So in effect she has improved 8lb or so since last August as opposed to early May.
She also had no run since Newmarket thus reducing the stress that say JTJ had.
Only a theory thats all.
 
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