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After reading quite a few comments on different threads regarding jockeys performances in certain races at Ascot I thought I would pop this thread on and see what everyone thought of the riding during Ascot.
Personally I backed a few that on initial viewing looked like they were badly ridden but on reflection I think their fate was decided either at the start or even before that becasue of the draw.
The examples I would use would be Music Show which was terribly drawn and I am not saying it would have beaten Lilly Langtry but the draw and the outside route it had to take didnt help.
Another one was an animal called Salute Him which Johnny Murtagh rode and finished really well from a bad position.
Imposing is another to consdier but I wonder if there were any more and how many that were beaten either before the gates opened becasue of the draw or lost their good advantage from the draw becasue of their start?I do agree with you, sir. Its best not to comment about races until much later. In the aftermath of the King George handicap, I was underneath a table scrating and bawling about Mr Spencer on Wigmore Hall but I reviewed the race over the weekend and decided he was unlucky and not incompetent. It happens and at 14/1, you can’t have everything.
However, my old friend Richard Hills (in the Coventry), showed that in a three cornered close finish between horses ridden by his good self, a Barbie doll with a missing arm, and a sack of Maris Piper potatoes, he will always be a hundred to thirty outsider of three.
In fact if I was a racehorse owner, I’d book the sack of potatoes before I’d book Mr Hills – possibly the luckiest fellow since that Lancaster bomber pilot who fell eighteen thousand feet from his burning plane into a Norwegian snowdrift and lived to tell the tale.
Other than that, I thought the riding was top notch all week. The Moore/Murtagh battle on those two fillies deserved much more publicity – a classic.
Hi Raymo61
Ascot has always struck me as a difficult track to ride even though it is fairly level. I think that the relatively short straight causes inevitable bunching and increases the likelihood of bad luck stories / bad rides occurring.
I also think that the qjuickish ground means that horses are travelling marginally faster and this compounds the problem
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By and large I thought the hard luck stories were kept to a minimum this year, but Fran Berry rode an absolute shocker on Elyaadi in the Ascot Stakes (stone last and untouched 2.5 furlongs out before being asked to make up 15-20 lengths in the straight) and had Shane Kelly not been adjusting himself as the stalls opened in the Wokingham, Palace Moon may have snatched at least second.
Richard Hills on Elzaam. Unbelievable that he didn’t get a ban for clearing not riding the horse out. I may be talking slightly through my pockets, but still think if the horse was ridden out, would have won.
Richard Hills on Elzaam. Unbelievable that he didn’t get a ban for clearing not riding the horse out. I may be talking slightly through my pockets, but still think if the horse was ridden out, would have won.
Yeah you’re right, that was absolutely disgusting. He should be banned for that, he clearly thought he had the race won and stopped riding and I’m talking through my pocket aswell, so what, it was a real shocker.
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There’s no doubting that Stephen Hawking would be stronger in a finish than Richard Hills, but he did absolutely nothing wrong in being beaten by the best horse (and by some margin) in the race. He may well have patted himself on the back a furlong out in the belief that he had it won, but given how green Elzaam was he did what he thought he had to do to give the horse every chance.
Unlucky at Ascot?? LOL. You must have named this post after me. As much as I enjoyed the Royal-Ascot meet this past week. I had a terrible week betting the races. I did finally manage to hit a couple of races towards the end of the meet. Which kept me from being totally bankrupt. LOL. But many of the horses that I thought would and should perform well at Ascot just simply didn’t deliver. My biggest loss of the week came in the Prince of Wales Stakes. I backed Presvis the heaviest in the race. Which turned out to be a terrible decision on my part.
Ironic, really, that of the Devil’s Trinity of Jockeys often ridiculed on Internet fora, two of them featured in this race.
Yet, I’ve never understood the Hughes bashing. He’s a beautiful jockey to watch on a good horse. Watch Hughes on Strong Suit. You’ll notice just how aerodynamic he is, how parallel to the horse’s spine, how low, and how he hides himself from the oncoming wind using the full height of the colt’s neck. A fine exposition of the jockey’s art.
Contrast with the ride on Elzaam. In the final furlong, a panicked Hills, sensing a threat to his dominance in the race, began to flap his arms like a doomed turkey running from the axeman in the farmer’s yard. If you look at his head too, you’ll notice it moving awkwardly from side to side and up and down.
Combine the two actions and any forward momentum Elzaam had accumulated in the prior two furlongs was lost, allowing a streamlined Hughes to pounce.
While I agree with you to some extent about how green Elzaam was, Armchair, I can’t help feeling that Hughes would have nursed the Jarvis horse home.
Dermot Weld’s filly Moonlit Garden was better than the bare result stranded up the centre in the Queen Mary. With 6f sure to suit even better, I expect her to gain compensation at the Curragh tonight, as long as turning out quickly doesn’t inconvenience her. 2/1 is fair.
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Dermot Weld’s filly Moonlit Garden was better than the bare result stranded up the centre in the Queen Mary. With 6f sure to suit even better, I expect her to gain compensation at the Curragh tonight, as long as turning out quickly doesn’t inconvenience her. 2/1 is fair.
You bet! I think she would have very nearly won, given a decent draw on the day, even over the Ascot 5.
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