Wednesd-eyes Wide Open

The (4) and (5) graded races seem to be stuck in the average ruck, lately. There were six such races, Tuesday, of which three were successful. One was won by the clear top rated, one by the clear 2nd top rated and one by the joint 2nd top rated. Three, of course, were unsuccessful.

Hatta Diamond seemed very ill at ease on Folkestone's undulating track and also looked very green still. The combination contributed quite a lot to his defeat. Safari Adventures took a keen hold early and the final hill found him out after the last as he weakened into third close home. But every cloud.... We also gave subscribers the race as the best dutch of the day with Miss Pross. We also dutched. So it wasn't really a bad result for us or our subscribers.

Someone asked me today what I thought about the coverage racing gets from ATR and RUK, adding the further question of which I considered the best channel. Some say we are badly served by presenters and pundits compared to other sports. To this statement I ask: which sports?

After listening to years of moronic commentaries and summings up from football people on TV, I would say racing is excellently served - much better served than virtually all the sports I can think of. True, there are one or two below standard pundits two of whom, in my humble opinion, are on the Morning Line every Saturday morning.

To the other question, which is the best racing presentation between the two (ATR/RUK), I would not like to be too critical, save to say that in TV terms one is Newsround, the other News At Ten. I'll let you work out which is which yourselves.

Wednesday sees the opening Epsom meeting of the year. In my youth this meeting was eagerly awaited with the Blue Riband Derby Trial, the Great Met, and the City and Suburban being premier races of the time. Unfortunately, over the years the meeting has plunged to the depths of being just an above average mid-week meeting. How times change - for the worse in this case.

The Great Met (3-05) and the City and Suburban (4-15) are extremely competitive and very hard to work out. Aureate, Hatton Flight and Dream Desert look the three to play with in the Great Met, while in the City and Suburban, there seems to be virtually every horse in with a sneak. I personally like Hawaass and Ladies Best, one-two at Pontefract a couple of weeks ago. The fourth that day, Lake Poet appears to be a course specialist and is necessarily rated a big danger in a very wide open race. I will decide nearer to post time which - if any - I will bet. They are good races where an eye on the live market can pay dividends.

Have a good Wednesday.