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If anyone thinks the Derby was underwhelming, spare a thought for the Greyhound Derby (which has just been run on the undistinguished track in the middle of the defunct Towcester racecourse).
A five runner race with a vacant Trap 6 after one of the qualifiers was injured after the semi final. All five runners were trained in Ireland. And the coverage I watched was on a buffering At The Races livestream – which went split screen to a race at Romford as the runners were rounding the home turn.
And the complete rag pinged out and won.
I’m afraid greyhound racing in the UK is doomed. What with condemnation, not just from extremists but also organisations like the RSPCA, plus nonsense like this. Horse racing needs to take note and take care.
homersimpson – agree its a idiotically crazy rule but the comparisons you used are not the same as one horse’s incident happen at the end of a race and the other was happening mere seconds before the race had technically started.
BC’s incident whilst hampering him did not (given it was ground conditions he hates) ultimately affect where he would have finished either way. Personally, it should have been chalked up as an unfortunate racing incident (similar to if a horse had missed the break) but I guess for the boys at least his record shows that he remains unbeaten this season for whatever that is worth.
Unfortunately winning punters have been shafted (well assuming they didn’t get paid out before the decision was officially made) which is the worst thing to happen from the fallout of this whole sorry affair.
I agree the situation with the favourite is highly unsatisfactory. I feel very sorry for punters who have been hit with a hefty Rule 4 deduction.
I must admit that whenever I back a winner in cash on track, I always head straight to the bookie to get paid out asap. Just in case some nonsensical rabbit gets pulled out of the hat. Well done to any punters who did get paid in full.
Whelan joins McNamara and Beggy as a Ballydoyle work rider who has ridden a Derby winner.
Back in 1997 we laughed at Willie Ryan being a Derby winning jockey.
Coolmore are obviously good at what they do. But this was another year when they didn’t really have a star and just threw a few darts at the board and hoped they hit the bullseye.
With their darts the bullseye becomes bigger every year. But, you have to give them credit for winning it even with lesser horses. I wonder what the Godolphin operation is thinking right now.
p (lower case) denotes capable of better
P (capital) means capable of a lot betterThanks for the explanation, Gladders. I hope you enjoyed your day out at the track.
Cheers, Ruby. 👍
‘Twas wet and windy – and they were strung out like three mile chasers in several races – but Derby Day is still special to me, as a (relatively) local lad.
It does get boring that Coolmore win it every year, though, and not always with their supposed number one.
‘‘Twas wet and windy – and they were strung out like three mile chasers in several races – but Derby Day is still special to me, as a (relatively) local lad.
Nice to hear that. A pity that even the Coronation Cup had such underwhelming result. Francis-Henri Graffard was quite upset about himself after letting Calandagan run after all.
A Derby without Aga Khan, Godolphin or John Gosden owned/trained runners just doesn’t feel the same. I also miss Sir Michael Stoute in this race, he had more winners than Godolphin in the past 26 years.
Good old days….. long gone.Same as everything these days, sadly: the rich get richer, while the rest are left to fight over scraps.
I’ve made this point in the past, but I think it bears repeating: in the good old days, a stable would consider themselves lucky to have just one Derby horse. Coolmore have them falling out of their ears.
If we could get some quality in return. Maybe I’m just too naive, but racing was much more fun when you had to guess which horse would be a proper Derby candidate. Nowadays it’s like CAS and other pointed out, the Lads get their share of darts and once every 2-3 years they hit the bullseye.
But ask them about the 3-yo hierarchy within the stable and they’ll get wrong almost every single time.For a race which hands over £1m to the winner you would have to question why it didn’t attract a better field or maybe there aren’t the horses to create a better field.
The more I know the less I understand.
It’s funny that, despite all their success, Coolmore have never had a true champion.
Timeform ratings aren’t infallible, of course, but their highest rated Coolmore horse was Hawk Wing – and his rating of 136 is based on his possibly fluky performance in the Lockinge as a 4yo.
Montjeu, owned by Michael Tabor, had a rating of 137.
So a horse puts its leg down a hole through no fault of its own and it’s tough.
One lifts it up in the stalls and its a nr
Spot on Homer
Ladbrokes apparently waived the deduction but not Paddy Power.
Things turn out best for those who make the best of how things turn out...Few (if any) high achieving home breds too. Odd that such a huge “breeding” operation has to buy in most of its top horses.
If you are a punter you pay your money and take your chance we all know that. How many of us have cursed our horses losing it at the start it’s life you move on and don’t expect your money back.
The more I know the less I understand.
“For a race which hands over £1m to the winner you would have to question why it didn’t attract a better field or maybe there aren’t the horses to create a better field.”
With modern breeding, is a 12 furlong race for three year olds in early June now something of an anachronism? Is The Derby really going to identify the best horse of its generation?
I suppose the argument against that would be City Of Troy won at Epsom – but The Lads couldn’t wait to drop him back to 10 furlongs.
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