They way I look at it is that I don’t think the horse would have a problem racing on ground on the fast side of good as he is a fluent mover and doesn’t have an action that would suggest he needs give in the ground.
I doubt that the ground at Newbury today would pose any problem for the horse given it has been artificially watered to be ‘safe’ ground. The times for the first two races (albeit both for newcomers of age 2 and 3 which were pretty slowly run) were slow by 2.93s and 4.28s respectively which would suggest that the official ground description of good (watered) probably isn’t that far off the mark.
Re: Chester – the course is only just one mile around and as such I would not imagine connections would deem it a suitable option, even if it gives them an inbuilt excuse if he ran badly – which would probably result in many of us here questioning Hendo’s reasoning for running him there in the first place.
The trip question is a little more open to interpretation as his first two runs over 12F were against novices/lowly rated horses and as such he wasn’t hard pressed to travel as he did and quicken up but as he goes up in grade he will be facing quicker/better horses and as such he may require a slightly further trip, which is why I think 14F and 16F races should also be seriously considered……..they will also open up more options especially if Hendo is going to be ultra picky on what ground he will and will not run him on for 12F races.