Chester Preview 26th July
Saturday’s Midsummer meeting gets underway at 1:30 with a handicap over the 12-furlong trip. This is a difficult race to pull apart. Karthon is perhaps the obvious improver in the race. This lightly raced 3-year-old trained by Andrew Balding finished 2nd on his latest start at Southwell in June when chasing home Frostmagic. He definitely stays this far and confirmed that point by recording the fastest run-out speed in the field at 32.75 mph, but he was caught out for pace by the winner in the final furlong. Stall 10 is a concern too given that his opening furlong of 16.30s ranked only 5th at Southwell and he will need to be sharper than that to get into a prominent position. Frostmagic hit the frame on his next start and the 5th placed Hibernate confirmed the Southwell form by winning in the interim period, but in a deeper race, Karthon does need to improve if he is going to win this. Warrior Lion is yet to in in 16 starts which is an obvious concern, but he has been steadily improving since joining Jennie Candish and there are plenty of reasons for optimism from the data of his most recent start at Doncaster. Having been held up in rear, he came wide to make his challenge, covering more ground than the winner despite having a shorter peak average stride length. In truth, he was set a very difficult task, but only the winner ran a faster final furlong than the 13.11s recorded by Warrior Lion and from the same mark, he looks to be a very solid each-way bet in the opening race on a track that should be more suitable.
The John Smith’s Maiden Stakes at 2:10 offers one of the stronger bets on the card in the form of Oratorical from the David Loughnane yard. He finished 2nd on his debut at Chepstow behind Who is Alice but having started slower than the winner, he was fastest horse in the field for furlongs 3, 4 and 5 and recorded a top speed of 44.20 mph. The winner made every yard of the running after a fast start and that gave Oratorical too much ground to make up. However, he certainly outran his 50/1 starting price and showed more than enough ability to suggest that he can win a maiden like this. With an ideal draw in stall 1 and the benefit of his first experience on the track, he should be able to break his maiden tag.
The Birra Moretti handicap at 3:15 offers us the chance to test the form of Miraculous. He was a winner here 2-weeks ago when he ran final furlongs of 11.85 and 11.97s to run down Veydari in the closing stages. That was a second win in 6 starts for Roger Varian’s 3-year-old son of Too Darn Hot and having recorded the highest average stride frequency in the field at 2.42 per second, here appears to be perfectly suited to the turning nature of the Roodee. He’s drawn in stall 10 and he has a 6 lb rise from the handicapper to contend with too, which would temper our enthusiasm slightly in what appears to be a more competitive race. However, he is one of the most progressive horses running on Saturday’s card and may well prove to be considerably better than this grade in time.
The card ends at 5:30 with the Cruzcampo handicap over the 10-furlong trip. A case can be made for several of these horses, but the one who appeals most as a nice each-way selection to end the card is the Michael Bell trained Let’s Dream. Although he was beaten by 4-lengths over this course and distance earlier in the month, the winner (Grey Cuban) was able to dominate the race after fast opening furlongs of 17.79 and 11.60s. Let’s Dream wasn’t able to get on terms, but he finished 5-lengths clear of the rest and his final time of 2:09.35 was still 3.79s faster than the TPD expected time for the course and distance under those conditions. Only the winner ran a better final 2-furlongs and with a run-out speed figure of 32.81 mph, Let’s Dream hit the line in a manner that suggested he is close to peak form. He was a winner over this course and distance back in May and with Joe Bradnam able to claim 7 lbs off his back, he is effectively only 1 lb higher on Saturday afternoon and should have a great chance to add a 3rd win to his CV.