Boston’s Gift upsurge came as a major surprise
It was a bit of a revelation really when Boston’s Gift finished second in the beginners’ chase at Naas on Wednesday. He had shown absolutely nothing throughout his career but we schooled him over fences and he jumped really well.
He was drinking in the last-chance saloon at this stage but now the plans have had to be revised because he just seems to be a completely different animal over fences.
It is unusual but not unique for this to happen. The last horse I had who was transformed by fences was Gemini Lucy.
She did manage to win a handicap hurdle off a rating in the 90s but once she saw the bigger obstacles, she was much better. Some of them just seem to relish the fences more, they make ground with every jump. They are clearly enjoying it.
Boston’s Gift was rated 88 over hurdles and when you compare that with some of the horses he ran against during the week, to finish second beaten half a length was a brilliant run. To be honest, it was the highlight of the week for me.
The other aspect of it was that I had always thought that he wouldn’t act on soft to heavy ground but he seemed to cope with it no problem. As I said, they’d make liars of you.
He will head for another beginners’ chase now and given the way he went in his opening run over fences, I will be hoping he’d win it.
He was my only runner during the week after the three I had in Navan. Got Attitude was a bit disappointing in the Troytown but I think that the ground might have been a factor.
Meitheamh was a disappointment too in the maiden hurdle but I was delighted with Ricardian who came fourth in the same race. He’s a big chasing type who was having his first run and a very pleasing run it was.
Hopefully we’ll have a big day of racing at Fairyhouse tomorrow. If it doesn’t happen, it will be through no fault of the people at the track as they’ve tried everything. Moving today’s card to Thursday was sensible because of the heavy frost predicted for last night and tonight.
According to the English forecast, the cold snap is given for 10 days. It’s not so much the frost itself that presents the problem, rather than the fact that the temperatures might not get high enough for there to be a thaw.
The quality of the card is something else. The Royal Bond is a good race, the Drinmore Chase is a very, very good race and the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle is probably the best renewal for many a year. Normally you only get five or six runners in the Hatton’s Grace but we’ve 11 this year and you can make a case for most of them. On the ratings, Summit Meeting looks outclassed but he’s going back up to two and a half miles and he’s run in a lot of good hurdles races. I schooled him mid-week and he went very well so we’ll see.
The only notable absentee from the Drinmore is Noble Prince and with Jessie’s Dream, Realt Dubh and Mikael D’Haguenet amongst those in it, it should be a cracker. Boston’s Angel takes his chance and he’s entitled to. He has run in two chases and won very easily last time out, having seven lengths to spare. He was second to Thegreatjohnbrowne before that and he’s franked the form since.
He seems to be in great form and right now, you don’t know how good he is but then you don’t know how good some of the others are either. We’ll have a much better idea tomorrow evening though.
Hume River has top weight in the handicap chase and the good news is that the field is a smaller one than was the case in the Cork National. He disappointed us a little that day but as I said here the week after, he mightn’t be the bravest and didn’t react well to getting squeezed once or twice.
That shouldn’t be an issue in a smaller field and we’ve cheek pieces on for the first time as well.
The second race on the card is a memorial to my brother and I would love to win it with No One Tells Me. She’s getting 10lbs off the top three and that’s a lot given that she was quite highly rated over hurdles. She schooled yesterday morning and I was very happy with her. She’d have a chance. It means a lot to have this memorial to John and to have it in Fairyhouse. He was very heavily associated with the track. To win the race would mean the world to me.
