Equinties - good girls

Gm Equinauts

Unless there is a message for one, mid-week racing normally always lacks the horses to get a punter excited and as such, a punters time abandons the lower, bookies friendly grades allowing for focus on the racing ahead, namely the ‘Saturday horses’.

Yesterday wasn’t one of those days however. With the sun shining as if it was a day in June, Leopardstown, Nottingham and Kempton all put on shows to make a bog standard Wednesday feel like a Saturday,

and there were several horses making their debuts we’re going to see a hell of a lot more of in the future.

Let’s dive in.

HEADLINE ROUNDUP

COLD ON COSMIC?

COSMIC YEAR won again yesterday, as if that was ever in doubt.

The half-brother to TIME TEST did it well and travelled easily albeit with a high head carriage and kicked clear like he needed to. He clearly has talent but here are some small question marks regarding yesterday’s win, the main one being the strength of the race. Who knows, HIT SQUAD, ROARING TWENTIES, NATIONAL PARK, and HONVED could turn into very smart horses in time but the first three mentioned there were all making their debuts, so they are bound to improve as they mature and gain experience.

So, with this information on board, seeing him at 6/1 in places for the 2000 Guineas does seem on the skinny side. As we’ve said, he’s not a bad horse by any means, but his current offering in the market is outrageous given what he’s achieved thus far.

Furthermore, and this is probably the more important point, he’s not a definite for Newmarket. Harry Charlton has always been slightly windy on his participation in the English 2000 Guineas, but to see him still sitting on the fence after his reappearance is a concern.

Charlton said: "It was as good as we could have hoped for. They went slow and he has such a good temperament to take it all in his stride.

"We'll have to speak to the Juddmonte team about plans as they have a lot of other horses, like Jonquil and Field Of Gold. There's a few horses in the mix so we'll let the dust settle.

"I would be a little wary – as I was with Newbury this weekend – of running him on quick ground. The weather will change at some point but if it stays dry through the month it feels like it could be a bit of a tough ask.

"The French and Irish Guineas are other options, as well as different routes into Royal Ascot, but we'll see what the team want to do. It's massively important to have these kind of horses in the yard and to be able to deliver for a proper operation like Juddmonte is essential."

Harry Charlton doesn’t mind missing these early-season Classics in favour of protecting the horse and maybe lining up Royal Ascot instead. KING’S GAMBIT last season would be an example, though his handicap mark of 92 was hard to ignore in the London Gold Cup.

So, if you’ve backed COSMIC YEAR at the big prices, just be weary, but if you were looking to back him for the Guineas after last night, we think you should be really careful.

GOOD GIRLS

TARNAWA, ABOVE THE CURVE, SAVETHELASTDANCE, GALILEO DAME. These are four of the last five winners of the 1m2f fillies maiden that occurred at Leopardstown yesterday, and the latest name to add to the list is CATALINA DELCARPIO for Paddy Twomey.

Now, this win in this specific race doesn’t mean that CATALINA DELCARPIO is set for Group 1 fame instantly, but she certainly has the 400,000gns price tag to go along with the lofty targets.

Which lofty targets could she have? Well, SAVETHELASTDANCE won the 2023 Irish Oaks and CATALINA DELCARPIO has an entry for the same race. Twomey didn’t explicitly mention that in his post-race quotes, but he was quite complementary of her.

He said: "She's a nice filly. She was just ready to start and most of mine on debut can be green and she was, but I thought if we would have a first-time-out maiden winner this year it could be her.

"She trains very well and finds everything very easy, and I just thought she might have enough class to carry her through. I told the owner last week I was going to put her in the Epsom Oaks and then I said I wasn't going to as it was too soon in her development. I have the Irish Oaks in mind for her."

She’s quite a nice filly and has plenty of potential. Another good girl we saw yesterday was KON TIKI for legendary trainer Jane Chapple-Hyam.

She’s long been regarded as the yards main 1000 Guineas hope so although yesterdays heat at Kempton was hyper-competitive with the vast majority of the unbeaten field turning it into a Guineas trial, she really needed to win and win well to stamp her big race credentials.

Alas, she just did that with ease and was subsequently shortened, 100’s into 40’s for the blue ribbon event. Her pedigree is fairly similar to the 11'8 favourite DESERT FLOWER - by NIGHT OF THUNDER and out of a 100 rated mare meaning she has the blood to show up and even the available 40’s could look massive on the day.

Two good girls to follow.

DANCING CHARYNS PATH

DANCING GEMINI is ‘doing a CHARYN’ this season, but will he be good enough to emulate last season’s champion miler?

It feels like it really hasn’t been much time since we last said goodbye to Roger Varian’s three-time Group 1-winning son of DARK ANGEL, but he absolutely won’t be forgotten about any time soon as big Roger Teal is using his ‘been there, done that’ career as a route for his star.

That’s right, Roger Teal is set to send DANCING GEMINI to the Group 2 bet365 Mile at Sandown later this month, and it all makes a lot of sense.

Although CHARYN and DANCING GEMINI have different trainers, they both missed out on Group 1s as a three-year-old and they both started their four-year-old campaigns with facile successes in the Listed Doncaster Mile.

If you have a hardy four-year-old in your yard who is ground versatile, why not target a few of these early-season races in order to pick up good prize money away from the truly competitive racing elsewhere in the season? It does make sense.

Anyway, Roger Teal added more clarity, as he said: “More than likely, if the ground is OK we will be going to Sandown.

“We’ll follow the Charyn route, it worked for him last year. We sort of mapped out his plan early to do it similar to Charyn. We might not mirror it fully, but certainly the first few races so that is the plan at the moment.

“The ground he got at Doncaster was just about perfect for him, he won’t mind good ground at all, he doesn’t have to have soft in the description, it was just nice to see him on nice ground where he could show his turn of foot.

“Hopefully they don’t over-water. I know we need rain, but knowing my luck it will break just before Sandown. The weather has been a bit abnormal, all last summer we were racing on soft ground, we’re probably having our summer now!”

RISK ON

After a good day yesterday, there are no bets today as of yet.

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