DOUBLE HANDFUL
IT’S Easter Family Day at Haydock today with a circus theme — The Greatest Show on Turf. Kids go free as a full day of on-stage entertainment with performances from fire-eaters, illusionists, jugglers, contortionists and unicyclists is laid on by the course.
It’s great to see racecourses cater for the younger generation.
It’s important that they are distracted while I divide my time between the betting ring and the bar.
When I was a kid I ran away with the circus, although my mother insisted I bring it back.
My main bet of the day will be made in the Betway Challenger Staying Chase Series Final Handicap Chase, otherwise known as the 2.40 at Haydock.
Run over three miles and one furlong, I’m surprised to see
priced up at doubledigit
SUMKINDOFKING
figures.
I expect his odds to shrink like a non-branded sausage on the barbie come the off.
Let’s be honest, with the jump season teetering to an end, this isn’t the highestcalibre field.
But I’ve always maintained a good race is only a good race if I’ve backed the winner.
Tom George’s eight-year-old is the classiest horse in the contest, which admittedly is like saying Gary Neville is the best-looking brother in his family.
If you can get an each-way price I suggest you do so early because Sumkindofking is a model of consistency when it comes to chasing.
In 10 chase starts he’s finished in the top five on nine occasions and in the top three on seven occasions.
If he’s out of the frame today then we’re out of luck.
Okay, he carries top weight and flopped on his last outing when 14th out of 22 runners but that was at Cheltenham where the class of horse is considerably better than he’ll be facing today.
His last two wins (at Ludlow and Market Rasen) came on good ground so the recent dry spell should strengthen his already solid claims. I CAN’T let this column pass without a word about Winx. The Australian superstar is tougher than a two-week old French baguette.
The seven-year-old mare brought the curtain down on her long and amazing career by winning the Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Randwick last Saturday.
That was her 33rd consecutive victory and her 25th at Group 1 level, remarkable statistics by anyone’s standards — and mine have always been limbo low.
Some will always question her achievements given she never travelled outside of Australia.
Pretty much everyone in Down Under has, at some given point, made their way out of the Australia.
Most of them end up in England — complaining about warm beer and the cold climate.
It’s true that Winx never went abroad to face the best Europe had to offer, but it’s equally true that no top horse from Europe went to challenge her.
A massive PR opportunity seems to have been missed somewhere along the line.
Winx retires as the highest earner of prizemoney in the history of horseracing and as an Australian sporting icon.
That’s a great career in anyone’s book.