MY CALL: WILL MR MARBELLOUZ HEAD FOR THE WEETWOOD AND TAKE AIM AT A HOMETOWN VICTORY?
By David Fowler | Tuesday, March 6, 2018
David Fowler is the principal thoroughbred caller for Radio TAB. David, who is a keen form student and punter, has enjoyed a lifetime involvement in the racing media. His personal blog, ‘My Call’, appears exclusively on HRO.
How good is Mr Marbellouz and isn't there an obvious target staring his connections right in their faces?
Two pertinent questions to be drawn from a bread and butter day of racing at Doomben on the weekend.
And sometimes on days of this nature we tend to flatter performances a little more than we should.
But it's fair to mark his brief city CV quite high considering the times and margins he has delivered.
True, he has been blessed with the rails alley each time but his natural speed should take bad luck out of any equation if he happens to draw widely in the future.
His trainer Kevin Kemp has pinpointed a 1200m Class 6 Plate at Doomben on March 24 as his next assignment.
So wouldn't the 1200m Weetwood a fortnight later on April 7 be an ideal target?
Any Toowoomba trainer worth his salt yearns to win their hometown sprint and Kemp has already tasted success in the Listed Sprint with Tellem (twice) and Startell.
The present open company sprint ranks aren't bulging with quality so surely the Weetwood would be a realistic target.
***************************************************************************************************
Last week's mention of apprentices' general riding weights being displayed with their claim needs to be brought up again.
Boris Thornton officially claims 3kg but rides two horses at Ipswich tomorrow which are allocated 55.5kg so in effect he will be able to take nothing of the claim as his general riding weight is 55 or 55.5kg.
That's obviously the considered choice of the trainer of both horses, Bryan Dais to book Thornton. Good luck to him.
But many punters will do their form banking on the 3kg claim as the riding weight is not shown alongside the claim.
I understand wheels move slowly a lot of times but surely as a compromise measure, a table could be included to show an apprentice's general riding weight.
**************************************************************************************************
Still on Ipswich, the first race is bordering on farcical.
I seriously have to pose the question does Racing Queensland understand the reasonably simple economics of revenue from turnover and prizemoney paid out?
Prizemoney isn't secured from the bottom of the garden. It arrives as a direct result from revenue from turnover,
So the product has to be as robust as possible at acceptance time to ensure the best possible return from turnover.
This was the very reason that races with 6 runners or less were scrapped at acceptance time because they wouldn't "cut the mustard".
So what has changed?
The first race tomorrow has five runners but it gets worse.
This race was given the green light knowing that two of the five runners are dual acceptors!
So there is every chance the first race carrying a $25,000 purse will have three runners.
Ultimately there will be a day of reckoning when poor turnover will not justify the prizemoney being paid out.
***************************************************************************************************
While this website is named "horseracingonly", a quick mention of the debacle at the Ipswich greyhounds on Sunday.
Two kennelmates got mixed up and each ran in the wrong race.
A shocking oversight by the trainer and the stewards. Simple identification checks fell by the wayside.
But what about the poor punter.
The greyhound in the second race was placed but was ultimately disqualified and not declared a non runner.
So the punter invested his money with no hope of collecting. All he or she could do was lose.
How unfair is that?
More articles
|