Glorious Goodwood Day 1

There are three meetings taking place this afternoon with the action all coming on the flat from Goodwood, Ayr and Yarmouth.  It is day one of the 'Glorious' meeting from Goodwood, the first of five great cards and it doesn't get much better than today's highlight, the Goodwood Cup which takes place at 3.15pm.  It features triple Ascot Gold Cup hero Stradivarius as he takes on potentially his biggest challenge so far in Irish Derby winner Santiago to who he has to concede 15lbs.  There is also a Group 2 contest on the card so we have some interesting action to watch this afternoon and the meeting is covered by ITV.  There are no runners from Pond House today.

Meanwhile, over in Ireland there is the second day of the Galway Festival.  Day one was a tough one for punters with only one favourite obliging and one other reaching the frame from their eight race card, although as usual, Dermot Weld was among the winners again, notching a double on the card.  He normally farms the fixture!

I see that Gordon Elliott is the lucky recipient of a change of stables for former Cheltenham Festival winner Presenting Percy.  You have to feel a little sorry for previous connections as prior to last season, they had done extremely well with the horse.  Still, it happens day in and day out in racing and it is only when a high profile horse changes yards that you get to hear about it.

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England's cricketers were frustrated as they try to wrap up a series win against the West Indies yesterday.  With just one day of the final test remaining they have the visitors on the ropes at 10-2 as they chase an unlikely target of 399.  It does mean that England need to take eight wickets today.  Things are certainly set up for an exciting finish.

Lewis Hamilton has been courting controversy again ahead of this weekend's British Grand Prix, sharing posts about conspiracies and the coronavirus pandemic on his Instagram social media account.  The post remained live for 13 hours before being deleted, drawing much criticism.  Hamilton went on to say that he hadn't noticed the comment attached to the post.  Careless considering the influence he has over his millions of followers.

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Thought for the day.  We have all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true.  Have a great day!