Inspiral

The 33/1 snapped up for the Guineas has long since gone.

She certainly looks a useful sort now.

not even a market up on the exchange

is there anything at york, doncaster before then ? or ireland

Looks like the May Hill is next.

Presumably the fillies mile after that if they persevere with her. She may be best on good going though as she does seem to like fast ground and I would not like to see her having a tough race on a bog.

the second could be an Oaks filly

Got a few £ on at 16/1 Elis then discovered 20/1 at Spoilsports. Loaded up again. Very, very impressive imho. Did everything wrong. Still won. Given the breeding I wouldn't kick the Oaks out either. Be surprised if JG has a better 2yo filly than that tbh

I wouldn't wish to detract from Inspiral's impressive performance at Sandown (especially considering she still looked a bit green and got to the front too soon), and at this stage she does look to me just about the best and most exciting of the 7f juvenile fillies we've seen so far this season (and more 'inspiring' than most of the 6f fillies seen thus far, with the possible exceptions of Sandrine and Hermana Estrella), but it needs to be put into context.

As I pointed out on the Guineas thread, this Listed race rarely has any significant bearing on the 1000 Guineas, with the recent exception of Billesdon Brook, who managed to get narrowly beaten in what at the time looked a substandard renewal of this race in 2017 before springing a massive surprise in the 1000 Guineas in 2018. The placed fillies on Thursday were officially rated 89 and 90 respectively, with Sunstrike having finished unplaced (beaten more than 6 lengths) behind Sandrine in the Gr.3 Albany Stakes at Ascot. The RP handicappers have seen no need to raise the ratings of those placed fillies, allocating them RPRs of 90 and 89, with Inspiral given a mark of 102. It's hard to envisage the official handicapper giving her a higher rating than that for this particular performance. This leaves her needing to find about a stone of improvement to have a winning chance in an average Guineas. With better races to come, she will have opportunities to achieve a much higher rating and put herself into serious contention for the Guineas, but this is still early in her career and she will be tackling better opposition from now on. The May Hill looks a sensible next target, since it's rarely contested by really top-notch performers, as a stepping stone to Group 1 targets later on. Gosden's usual approach in the past with his best fillies has been to pitch them straight into Group races (such as the Sweet Solera Stakes or the Prestige Stakes) following their maiden victories, so it came as a bit of a surprise to see him target the lowly Listed race at Sandown, as it's not a race he habitually targets with his better fillies.

In terms of performance and ratings I wouldn't place Inspiral much above Joseph O'Brien's Agartha, who was almost as impressive in winning the Gr.3 Silver Flash Stakes at Leopardstown on Thursday. There are a number of other smart looking prospects emerging in Ireland that are likely to contest key races in the coming weeks such as the Gr.2 Debutante Stakes and Gr.1 Moyglare Stud Stakes. For example, Dermot Weld's Frankel filly Homeless Songs, who beat Agartha by a couple of lengths on debut earlier this month, looks like she could develop into a smart type.

Having missed out on bigger prices for the Guineas, I certainly wouldn't be in any rush to take 16/1 Inspiral at this stage for the Guineas. Perhaps if nothing much emerges in the next few weeks, the 16/1 might be worth taking if it looks like she will have a fairly straightforward task in the May Hill.

I'm inclined to agree with everything you've written there, cryoftruth. I went back through recent (last 20 years) May Hill results and reminded myself that it has produced its fair share of top-class fillies, i.e. fillies successful at Group 1 level: it has featured a couple of subsequent winners of the 1000 Guineas (Ameerat and Speciosa, both placed in the May Hill), five fillies that subsequently finished placed in the Guineas (Hathrah, Maids Causeway, Spacious, Ihtimal, Laurens) and no fewer than eight winners of the Fillies' Mile (including two trained by John Gosden). It's been targeted by Gosden before and is a much better pointer to the Guineas than the race Inspiral won at Sandown. Given the classy way she won the Star Stakes, Inspiral is likely to be a warm order for the May Hill and she will have a good opportunity there to put up an improved performance/rating, and this in turn would put her in pole position for the Fillies' Mile (and the chance of achieving an even higher rating). At the moment she needs to find about 10-12 lbs improvement to be a serious Guineas contender, but she has done everything right so far and there is every reason to suppose she can progress to the top. There is nothing I would prefer for the Guineas ahead of Inspiral at this stage, and the only reason I haven't backed her is because her current odds (12/1 best price from 16/1) are simply too short for what she's actually achieved.

PS Agartha put up a seemingly much improved performance in the Gr.3 Silver Flash Stakes, and she may well be one of those slow-learning fillies that suddenly starts to make rapid improvement after a few runs suggesting she was nothing special. Her next couple of races (starting with the Gr.2 Debutante Stakes) will tell us a lot more.

Yes indeed James. There really will be a clue as to the value of Inspiral’s last win in that race, provided of course that the going is not entirely different.
Personally I think Wild Beauty will take quite a bit of beating as her form even before Sandown was pretty strong.

I like Value Theory too and she is a definite likely improver. Just wonder whether Gleneagles has been a tad disappointing as a stallion. He was a superb horse and as you say was bred in the purple. He has not really had a group 1 performer yet. Maybe Value Theory will be the one?

Confirm market position or bomb today?

never wise to get excited about 2 year olds........but she does look the real deal.

COT, I thought it refreshing that Gosden said it as he saw it. He didn't publicly humiliate Dettori, just said he thought he gave his horse a poor ride. If Dettori had held his hands up in the first place and said it wasn't a good ride then it wouldn't have been such a big deal. Dettori ought to have been big enough to accept some responsibility, but as he wasn't then it needed to be said, now he needs to be big enough to accept it. A nice change from the usually insular racing fraternity and its sycophantic, mealy mouthed media, where there are only "fantastic" rides and no poor ones.

A_T, all he said was he didn't over complicate it like he did the day before. That's hardly a public slagging. I just see it as clarification over his attitude to the defeat the day before, in light of the criticism he himself received from some of racing's snowflakes.

Of course time will tell Figgis.

RPR gave Inspiral 123 and I would personally not argue with that but I do think that she may well improve on that and also that she may actually already be better than the bare form.

She has now run in 5 races, including a group 2 and 2 group ones.

On 5 occasions she has quickened right away. keeps on doing a very fair impersonation of a champion.

She did it in the May Hill, then the fillies mile. There is not doubt at all she would have won the 1000 Guineas as well has she been ready to run there. She made the Coronation Stakes field look very slow and that race had a number of group one winners and group one placed horses in it.

She at least has the ability to repeatedly impersonate a champion, repeatedly giving the impression of being exceptional.

A question. If you see something that, every time you see her, looks like a duck, continues to quack, has feathers and goes well with orange sauce, would it not be wise, sooner or later, to conclude that you are in fact looking at a duck. Inspiral keeps looking like a brilliant champion with speed to burn. Maybe she does not just look like a champion. Perhaps she is!

Of course Inspiral might have got lucky 5 times and won 3 group races because the opposition was not up to much, we’re out of form, didn’t turn up or whatever. I think as she continues to make opponents all look like selling platers, the chances of her being lucky start to look longer and longer.

I personally think she would be well worth a crack at the Eclipse or the International at York. She would be my choice with WFA and fillies’ allowance against Baaeed.

And just to dispel the notion that I have taken some absurd bias against the filly, or that only an exceptional filly can win in such style, my personal favourite Guineas winning filly of recent years (and sadly the last one I backed ante post) was Sky Lantern. I'd argue that she was equally impressive in winning her Coronation Stakes, but she still wasn't on par with the best colts.

Well, I backed Harbinger for the KG and even remember making a bit of an ott statement on here that I'd be surprised if he was beaten at Ascot, but there's still no doubt the others ran some way below their best.

COT

I don't think Homeless Songs has quite hit the heights of Minding or Alpha Centauri either. Truth is if I take HS's best rating and Inspiral's then I have HS only 1lb ahead. Even if I was spot on I don't kid myself that confidence can be placed in such fine margins. The main reason I would go max on HS is the price, as it seems pretty clear the market is going to greatly favour Inspiral. Also I would prefer to side with the filly who has definitely shown she's recently improved. For as good as Inspiral's effort was I'm not convinced she improved, but we'll see. Obviously things will depend on what happens before they meet (if they do). If HS had a hard race beforehand and Inspiral wins easily then I may very well favour Inspiral. I might even back her against colts if I thought a race had softened up for her.

Not many posts I enjoy reading these days, but Fig, Sandown and COT you have made this topic interesting. Great analysis and perfect grammar to boot.

Homeless Songs is in the Falmouth but odds suggest not running - Weld very choosy about the ground for her so no guarantee the 2 will ever meet

The Ascot race shows you were extremely unlucky she did'nt
show for the Guineas,cryoftruth.You done well putting her
up well in advance,saying she's a good filly.Whether you
backed her on here,I dont know,hope you came out of the
Guineas with a few bob though,at least & this race.
   wd
    GL