Champions Day Ascot

I’d imagine it’ll be good/soft with some soft places looking at the forecast

Forecast changed again. So maybe good/soft ground but could be good looking at it

Always a great days racing AT

Agree AT

Some rain forecast Thursday evening but the rest of the week looking dry.
Hopefully no worse than good to soft.

Good ground looks likely - not good for my antepost positions.

ground looks almost certain to be the fastest for Champions Day since 2016

I want very soft ground; Trueshan to win and Baaeed to withdraw.

Harry, no her times have been absolute garbage this season. Actually, time-wise, I have her last 5 runs all within 2lbs of each other. Even though she won the Gp1 in France it was a poor race on the clock. There has to be a possibility she hasn't trained on. It's just that watching some of her races this year, especially her latest, she did enough to suggest she may still be capable of showing her best back at 6f. At the price, in what I consider a poor Gp1, I think she's worth risking.

i'd give her a good chance at 6f - they've been persisting at a mile to try to get big 8f winner on her sire's CV.

i forgive the last run on very soft - she's won all her other races at 7f and less.

Fair enough figgis. I think she’s been disappointing. I suppose the thing I haven’t liked much is she just looks asleep. I rated that cheviely park a top race at the time. I’ve backed Flotus a couple of times since but she hasn’t gone on and I’m not sure I gave the race to much credit at the time. She isn’t for me I do like 3 tomorrow in that race but garrus is grade 2 horse, naval pier I’m not getting enough odds and art power I’ve missed the price but think he has his chance.


Figgis 14 Oct 22 14:45 Joined: 28 Sep 04 | Topic/replies: 9,051 | Blogger: Figgis's blog
Harry, how did you interpret the performance of Modern Games at Woodbine? Do you think he improved or just ran his race against a weak field?

I’m been doing a lot of American work tbh figgis. I like studying the breeders cup. Anyway in regards modern games he got given a good American figure time wise. I thought he beat a horrible field of locals myself. I’ve always quite liked him as an individual, however without being anything special. He beat to some rank horses at woodbine though. Time was decent though at it followed on from good wood where he ran well in slowly run race.
I was very look warm on him for this but having gone back through him today, I don’t mind him, as at least he was surrounded by nice horses at good wood. Ground does seem quite important to him but I see no reason why he can’t run well. I wanted around 13/2 myself as haven’t got him far clear of the revenant.

I quite like in-spiral tomorrow tbh and think she is a fair price with a wide draw maybe the only negative. I didn’t like her run in France but on the back of a break I see he winning well.

Yourself?

Harry, as you'll probably know from previous posts on here I think Inspiral's reputation is bigger than her ability. I'm certainly not saying she's no good, just that her performances have been no better than we'd get from an average Guineas winner, but she's been elevated to some kind of superstar status in what overall is a poor season. In a typical QE2 I'd think her very beatable, against most of these not so.

As to Modern Games, I have no more than a casual interest in American/Canadian racing. I have never put the effort in required to seriously rate those races and won't be starting now. So I won't pretend I have any major confidence when making assessments. That said, time-wise, MG looked to have improved a few pounds using the run of Mysterious Night as a guide. I know what MN was capable of over here and even if he didn't improve again with this latest win, on the face of it, it seems a comparatively impressive performance from Modern Games. I'll be backing him.

Harry, I'm in a minority in thinking that Baaeed's winning performances are what we usually get from a typical top class Gp1 performer but again he's been elevated to superstar status in a poor year. I don't rate his York win any higher than many other up to scratch winners of the race. But with the momentum gathering behind his unbeaten run I think people were looking for that one big performance from him so were keen to rate it very highly when he finally delivered one. Where I do think he has been better than some other top performers is he's been doing it consistently, running fast times repeatedly this year with no regressions. I give him big credit for that. Although in the back of my mind I wonder if that would've been the case if he'd faced one other serious rival. He also looks like has a bit more up his sleeve, and maybe he does, but I would've liked that to have been tested by another rival capable of running up to Gp1 standard on the clock this year.

I think if Adayar trained on as a 4yo then he'd have a really good chance of matching and probably beating Baaeed. However, that has to be a major doubt with the problems of getting him to the track this year. I think if Baaeed finally does regress a few pounds (and that's easily understandable after the season he's had) he still beats the vast majority of these. I don't have them anywhere even close to him and in my view he'll need to bomb out for them to get the better of him. I think the one exception is Adayar. Even if he only runs to last year's best then I think Baaeed can't afford to drop off more than a few pounds. Baaeed is quite obviously the most likely winner but I'm backing Adayar as I think it's not too unlikely that he runs to form and Baaeed isn't quite at his best.

Get

Alot of forgiveness is needed with Emily upjohn. I liked her in the king George but she ran like a pig. I still think she's best of these mares and she might look massive at 4/1 after the race. I doubt gosden is just out for the day out with her. We will see I'll have a look at her I'm the paddock and see how she is.

Trueshan is big at nearly 2/1. I didn't like the way he wandered under pressure at Doncaster. Its quite possible they bottomed under the big weight in the plate. He is much the best here. I'm with you on the ledger. I'm tempted by a couple of rags in this but need to sit down with myself tonight and decide how to play the race. It stinks if trueshan doesn't turn up to the party

I didn't like the way he wandered under pressure at Doncaster

Harry, pretty sure he's done that a bit on more than one occasion when winning, but it always looks worse when a horse does that when getting beat. Anyway, like you say it's possible he was bottomed at Newcastle, but with the ride he was given last time I'm willing to put that forward as the more likely reason he was beaten and have to back him at these odds against these opponents.

A_T, if Adayar isn't the horse he was then, to be fair, any genuine Gp1 horse should be hammering this lot. None of them would figure in a really competitive Gp1. For me, a 9 length beating of any of them would be no better than a 9 length beating of Sir Busker.

Ok so bets for the day for me
Inspiral
Trawlerman ew
Art power
Baeed and bay bridge 1-2
A tri cast on the balmoral but won’t bother you with that
Enjoy the day, I’m off to see the unbeaten colt

Good to Soft, Soft (in places)
   
Straight: 7.3, Round: 6.7, on Saturday at 8am.

last year:

Good to Soft, Soft (in places)
   
Straight: 7.6 Round: 6.4 on 16-10-2021 at 07:30

2020:

Round: Soft, Heavy (in places) Straight: Soft
   
Stands side:5.4 Centre:5.4 Farside:5.5. Round:4.8 on Saturday at 9am. The readings may be slightly lower than expected due to aeration to the whole track carried out on Tuesday 6/10/20

I think a comprehensive beating of a second-placed Adayar could well see a very high rating

A_T, I agree if it appears that Adayar ran to form and that horse gives the others a comprehensive beating. If, however, Adayar runs a long way below his best, as Mishriff did at York, I hope they don't try to rate the winner without taking that into account.