We had a lovely Christmas at home in England. It was cold and crisp and we returned carrying far too much overweight. I have not been home for Christmas for close on thirty years and if I told you how long it has been since Fee was in England for Christmas, it would give her age away and I would get a slap around the years so I will rather keep my mouth shut, writes Joey Ramsden
Our girls loved every minute of it. The colder and frostier it was, the more they loved it. A great time was had by all but it was great to get back to the horses.
High Jump
While we were in the UK, we got to see some fantastic jump racing, run on reasonably good ground. When jumping is done on that type of surface, it is special to watch and something to behold. This year’s Champion Hurdle looks to be a top notch event, with trainer Willie Mullins holding all the aces. He has a smashing young hurdler, The New One, that is looking to try and take the crown. The build up to the Champion Hurdle will be great and it is well worth keeping an eye on.
The horses have been in fine form and it has been fantastic to watch horses we rated, like The Conglomerate and a few others, show their mettle. They look to be really smart horses for the future.
Cold As Ice has never put a foot wrong and was extremely impressive on Saturday in the Sceptre Stakes. She made us all really proud. I cannot wait to run her on Met Day over a mile and see what type of performance she puts in.
Royal Affair
The L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate was an interesting race.
Legislate let the side down but it is good they found an answer and I suppose it is now a race against time as to getting him right. I have no doubt Justin will do it.
The Queen’s Plate is a special race to win and Futura was impressive. Louis The King put in an eye-catching performance and there looks to be plenty of improvement in him. He may be the one they all have to catch in just over a week’s time. Queen’s Plate day is one of the best day’s racing of the year so it was lovely to land a feature race on the day ourselves.
Dubious decision against Gallica Rose
As happy as I was for Cold As Ice to win on Saturday, it was so disappointing to lose – in the boardroom – the 2400m feature race with Gallica Rose. I am not sure how one loses an objection when the horse you beat moves six horses across and starts the interference. But that’s a case for the stipes and I really can’t be bothered to argue with them.
All I can say is that on that decision, it looks like open days ahead on objections. However, I have won some objections I should never have won and I have lost objections I should never have lost so I suppose it is rub of the green. The one word I cannot use in any of this is consistency.
While this is being written, Red Ray was scheduled to run in Dubai. This looks the ideal race for him, being 1400m on the turf. He always runs well fresh and I might just be having a few hard-earned sheckles on him.
Sales Week
We have the CTS sales down here this week. As usual, it will be an amazing show and we will be putting in all the long, hard leg work. There are some smashing horses to view and some of the best pedigrees in the land. Sales week is really difficult and tiring but if one is lucky enough to have owners to buy, extremely rewarding. I am looking forward to it in some ways but dreading it in others as the leg work can be really, really tough on one.
Along with the sales, we have the CTS Stakes race. It looks a wide open event.
It was good to have had the top three rated horses in the race in Kingvoldt, Cold As Ice and Act Of War. As I said earlier, we decided to try Cold As Ice over the mile in the Majorca on Met Day. One does not often get Grade 1 Fillies mile races on one’s doorstep.
With Act of War, we decided to go for the Investec Cape Derby. I see Mike is bringing something down so it will be more than interesting to take him on and see how good we are. With two of the top three out of the CTS race, it has weakened the field slightly and hopefully Kingvoldt can come through and do the business for us. Brutal Force is also doing exceptionally well and it would not surprise me to see Stem In Die Bos run into the money.
Very Mobile
I had a little mishap at the sales on Monday whilst washing my hands.
I left my cell phone behind. Sadly I am not much of a techno-fundi and am not lucky enough to own an Apple, Samsung or anything similar.
I own (owned) a very boring old Nokia and found it extremely sad it was not handed in as the reward would have been worth far more than the phone itself. It is going to be a right pain getting all my contacts onto a new sim card. If anyone sees an old Nokia lurking round at the CTICC, it only has one man’s name on it – mine!
The weather looks set fair to be warm with a strong wind which plays havoc with the training tracks. Even though they do try extremely hard to get enough water onto them, it is never enough. It makes the training just that bit more difficult as the tracks can be inconsistent. This is where our treadmills are a godsend.
Act Of War and Variety Club are just two of Markus Jooste’s runners to have done well
Derek Brugman was off to the Cartier awards to pick up a nice prize for Variety Club and it was smashing and extremely rewarding to see him win something big.
We still miss the old fellow in the yard.
Talking of Variety Club, it will be great to have Anton Marcus back in full swing after damaging his thumb. One thing about Ant, he is as reliable as clock work and I don’t think it will take him long to get back into the swing of things.
West Ham keep flying the flag high for me so I am a happy but tired Hammer at the moment. Long may it continue.
www.joeyramsden.com
