Bella A Beauty At Warwick!

The stable had a fantastic day yesterday at Warwick even though two non-runners meant that only Bella ran from the yard.  She put up a career best performance to land the four year old fillies' handicap hurdle and in the process land the handsome £25,024 first prize.  I am sure that when they put the race on Warwick officials were hoping for a more competitive race and David suggested that this was the wrong sort of race at the wrong time of the year.  Even so, I know he will be thrilled to win it with Bella who was given a great ride by Tom Scudamore - it was an excellent bit of placement by the trainer and in the process it lifted him back to the top of the trainers' table at this early stage of the season.

It was also a good day for conditional jockey Michael Heard who rode a winner for Caroline Bailey at Warwick.  Michael is a rapidly improving young jockey and is very good value for his 7lbs allowance, although he won't have it for much longer at this rate...three more winners and his claim reduces to 5lbs.

I saw that McCoy was judging the best dressed lady competition at Warwick yesterday and it wasn't until I read on that I realised it was the retired champion's wife, Chanelle doing the judging.  I can't imagine A P judging a fashion competition...he was probably at Wentworth yesterday for the pro-am tournament with the likes of Richard Hughes and Mick Fitzgerald.

Today we have five meetings taking place with flat cards from Goodwood, Ayr, Sandown and Nottingham as well as a jumps card from Wetherby.  The stable has one runner today as decent juvenile hurdler Unanimite takes in the handicap hurdle at Wetherby.  He was a winner on the flat in France, while he was also succesful over hurdles at Market Rasen last season.  A handicap mark of 134 means that he will have to produce a good performance to feature although he certainly has the latent talent to go well in a race of this nature, while this step up in trip could bring about further improvement.

I had a drink with Richard Hannon Senior Alistair Down and MCP yesterday courtesy of the Racing Post who are composing an article on the legends.  Alistair had a real job keeping the pair of them in check!  Richard is a great story teller and would make a great public speaker although it would have to be adults only if you know what I mean!  This was after five bottles of wine!

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What a performance from Sunderland yesterday to earn a point against Arsenal and keep them in the Premier League.  Dick Advocat must be a good manager.

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Apparently Roger Bannister's shoes that he wore when he broke the world record, becoming the first man to run a sub-four minute mile are going on sale and are expected to make £50,000 at Christie's.  Just think he would be beaten by a couple of hundred yards these days - isn't it amazing how the pace of life, literally has sped up.

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It is the start of the golf and the cricket this afternoon and I have already reserved my seat in front of the television and hidden the remote somewhere Mrs Barnes can't find it!

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Apparently the story of Cinderella originated in China - know that sounds like a fairy story to me!

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