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Monday 22nd January

Normal service resumed after the big freeze with the stylish success of Inthewaterside in his first handicap hurdle at Lingfield on Sunday.

Inthewaterside was our only runner of the day, the first for a week and made light of his opening mark of 120 with a fluent victory from the front. He was given a fine tactical ride by Harry Cobden who poached an early lead, dictated the pace throughout and kept enough in hand to see off the late challenge of He’s A Latchico. This bought up Harry’s 100th winner of the season.
Inthewaterside is a gorgeous horse with a big future and I blame myself for running him too soon at Ascot last time after he won on his hurdles debut at Aintree. He is going to be a cracking chaser. Meanwhile, I will find a nice race for him to gain more experience.
Team Ditcheat we’re kept busy last week in the yard and on the gallops even though jump racing was frozen off day after day.
My assistant Charlie Davis and the boys gritted the roads in the village early each morning, the gallops were fine despite the freezing temperatures and crucially the horses didn’t miss any exercise.
We worked loads and loads of horses at the weekend and will be rocking and rolling again starting at Cheltenham and Doncaster on Saturday. Then it will be on to Sandown and Musselburgh the following weekend all the way to the final day of the season back at Sandown late in April.
Horses under consideration for Cheltenham include Liari in the JCB Triumph Hurdle Trial, Il Ridoto in the £100,000 Paddy Power Podcast Handicap Chase, Rubaud in the Unibet Hurdle, Stay Away Fay in the Cotswold Chase, and Isaac Des Obeaux in the two and a half mile Ballymore Novice Hurdle. Ginny’s Destiny is another who is likely to be in the horsebox bound for Cheltenham.
At Doncaster Kandoo Kid might go for the Great Yorkshire Chase and Welcom To Cartries is a possible for the Grade 2 three mile Albert Bartlett Novice Hurdle.
Before then we will have runners through the week at Newbury, Chepstow, Huntingdon, and Sandown on Friday.
For all the latest news on all my runners on Saturday please do check out my Betfair column which goes live the previous day.

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Monday 15th January

Two classy French recruits offered untold promise for the future on a weekend when Pic D’Orhy came tantalisingly close to landing the Grade 2 Silviniaco Conti Chase for the second year running.

Kabral du Mathan set the ball rolling with a stylish success on his debut for us in a Class 2 Juvenile Hurdle at Huntingdon on Friday and Kalif Du Berlais was every bit as impressive when winning very nicely in another Class 2 juvenile hurdle a day later at Kempton. They both made light of their 8lbs penalties for winning their sole starts in France. Although they had been doing everything together at home for the last six weeks until they run you can never be quite sure what you have on your hands, but once Kabral won so well on Friday we were very confident of Kalif completing the double.
They are both gorgeous horses. Kalif Du Berlais is a lovely, big, scopey chasing model, a bit like Bravemansgame while Kabral Du Mathan is more a workmanlike type like Frodon. I imagine Kalif will wait for the Adonis Hurdle back at Kempton while Kabral is likely to go for the Victor Ludorum at Haydock or the Scottish Triumph Hurdle at Musselburgh.
Liari is also in the mix among a strong group of juveniles and I have to make plan for him with a few more nice prospects to run. I see Kabral as one for the Boodles Juvenile Handicap at Cheltenham and am not really tempted by the Triumph Hurdle for Kalif. He was bought to be a chaser and we will campaign him with that in mind.
It was great to see Pic D’Orhy sailing along in the lead, jumping superbly and in just failing to give 3lbs to Banbridge, a Grade 1 winner, I’d suggest he put up a career best. He kept jumping and galloping and if he’d winged the last it would have been really interesting on the run in.
Sonigino ran a little below par under top weight in the Lanzarote. He’ll have his mid winter flu jab now and a little break before I freshen him up for the two and a half mile handicap hurdle at Aintree.
We will again be fairly quiet this week before a handful of entries at the weekend when the forecast is not exactly encouraging.
But we plan to be back on song with plenty to run in time for Trials Day at Cheltenham at the end of the month. We will then be flat out for the rest of the season.
For all the latest news on my weekend runners please be sure to check out my Betfair column which goes live 24 hours earlier.

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Monday 8th January

With several race meetings called off and more than half our team on the easy list after their mid winter flu jabs we made a quiet start to January.

Joyou Allen made a highly pleasing debut for the yard with an impressive success in the bumper at Exeter on New Year’s Day. He’s a lovely prospect, a half brother to the Ryanair winner Envoi Allen, and showed bags of promise when second in his Point-to-Point in Ireland to a horse who has already made his mark in this country. We have taken our time with him, he’s been working nicely, made all the running at Exeter and kept on strongly in the closing stages. He will probably have one more run in the Spring before starting over hurdles next season.
Stage Star didn’t run his race under top weight on deep ground at Cheltenham and made a couple of mistakes before eventually being pulled up by Harry Cobden when his chance was gone. He was a bit sore afterwards and wasn’t quite right when we trotted him up a day later. But the good news is that he is A1 now after lots of physio and treatment and will be back cantering this week. We have plenty of time to freshen him up and get him spot on for the Ryanair Chase at Cheltenham.
Torrential rain late on Thursday evening led to plenty of flooding in our part of Somerset with the result that we had to rescue half a dozen horses from their boxes at the yard beside my house at Highbridge. It was a short term drama after a nearby river burst its banks. The horses were almost floating with the water and shavings up to their knees.
My head lad Clifford Baker and assistant Charlie Davies were quickly on the spot along with other staff to help move them to drier quarters close by. The water had gone by the morning when everything was back to normal.
We will have some runners through the week before a busy Saturday at Kempton and Warwick.
Pic d’Orhy goes for the Grade 2 Silviniaco Conti Chase and Sonigino is on course for the Lanzarote Hurdle.
We also plan to introduce two interesting ex French four year olds who both won on their hurdling debuts Kabral Du Mathan and Kalif Du Berlais. One will run at Huntingdon on Friday, the other at Kempton 24 hours later. In addition Brave Kingdom is an intended runner in the Grade 2 Hampton Novice Chase at Warwick while Broken Halo goes for the £100,000 Classic Handicap Chase.
For all the latest news on my Saturday runners please turn to my Betfair column which goes live the previous day.

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