Sunday’s News

Lady Buttons (near side) and Up the Bees

Updated tonight – our ‘Team  and ‘Gallery’ Pages’

A day without any runners but Phil was still up at 6am to take two important gallopers to Ripon, ridden by Eva – our Listed winner ‘Lady Heidi’ and her stable companion in the same ownership, Jamesbo’s Girl. Back in time for bacon sandwiches at 9! Yesterday we had just the one runner, Lazy Sioux at Doncaster and she has come back fine. She travelled nicely for a long way, hopefully the handicapper should leave her mark the same and she can be up to winning in the near future back in handicaps, she has a good attitude.

We have a fair few runners entered this week, not least our top class bumper horse ANIKNAM at Punchestown on Wednesday, pictured left.  He runs in their championship bumper and will be taking on much hotter opposition than he encountered at Hexham for his winning debut.  He is a talented 4 year old  and will receive an allowance off the 5 and 6 year olds. He will be on the ferry on Tuesday morning and then have plenty of time to settle in before his race.  Aniknam is now owned by Boretech Ltd and will run in their red and yellow colours. We wish them every success.

Tuesday also sees three flat runners – Musikhani at Nottingham and O’ly Roccs and Run fat lass Run at Wolverhampton, and as well as Aniknam at Punchestown on Wednesday we have three at Sedgefield – Triple Eight in the 2m 1f handicap hurdle, Jasper Massini in the 2m5f race and Man in Black making his debut for us in the novice hurdle. It would be good to see another winner or two before the end of the month.

Phil took these photos of Lauren Sissons on Agglestone Rock today, in his bid for a return to race fitness Lauren is riding him every day and doing a brilliant job with him – she always used to ride him when he was winning as a 4 year old. he looks in fantastic shape and its so far so good with the legs.  We are on course for a return to the track sometime in June if all continues to go smoothly.

We are pleased to say that Phillip Dennis has passed everything to become a conditional jockey and will be claiming 10lbs for us this summer – a exciting development in Phillip’s career and an excellent bonus to have that 10lbs on some of our smaller horses or those that don’t look too well handicapped. He is pictured here on his own horse, The Rustlin Rhino, trained by his father, Chris.

Lily Frank , grandaughter of Sue and Geoff that own winning Hunter Chase mare, Rosie du Berlais has also passed her jockeys course – for a Category ‘A’ Amateur Licence, you will be seeing her aboard sometime this summer as well and we wish her lots of success – she has had plenty of experience winning pony races.

It won’t be long before smart middle distance/stayer ‘Perennial’ makes his debut for the season for his Owners ‘The Gathered’ and ‘The Gathering’. He schools really well and we also hope he will be up to winning some good races on the flat this summer as well as hurdling. He is pictured here last winter schooling before we put him away for a break. Phil has a race in mind for him at Doncaster next week.  he is pictured schooling with Simon Olley.

We also welcomed back Burn Night last week, he has been holidaying at his part owners yard near the seaside and getting pre-trained so ready to strongly canter. he was consistent over hurdles last summer and we hope he can get back to winning ways this year.

Also ready to run shortly is the classy three year old ‘Istimraar’ who has been pleasing everyone with his schooling ahead of a juvenile hurdle campaign later in the year. This is what he has been bought for but in the meantime we hope to have some fun with him on the flat, he is a natural jumper.