Wednesday 11 July

Out of 400 odd horses left in the Tattersalls July Horses In Training Sale, I have whittled them down to 6 prospective purchases. They will have a range of values and we will be going over to Park Paddocks this evening to cast our eyes over them. Brett The Vet will be tagging along to give us the undoubted benefit of his wisdom, and we should be able to formulate a bidding plan for the remainder of the week. Interesting stuff over at Worcester this evening, where it looks very likely there will be a walkover in protest at the woeful prizemoney levels that seem to be par for the course over there. The plan is for 11 of the declared runners in the Novices Hurdle to be withdrawn, leaving one to canter to post and collect the prizemoney, which is incidently £900 below tarriff. This will mean that the course have to pay the prizemoney which will then be distributed by the winning connections to cover any fines incurred by the other 'runners', or donated to charity. Worcester have tried to mitigate the effect of the 'demonstration' by moving the race to the end of the card at 9.10, but it will highlight our cause. It has made the front page of The Racing Post today, and will surely generate more publicity after the event. On the flat the courses soon came into line with minimum tarriffs when Sheikh Mohammed declared that he would not have runners in sub tarriff races, and it will need actions like the one at Worcester tonight to highlight the Jump racing cause. We are right behind them!!