Author: Joel Roberts

A top-class race at a very tricky part of the National Hunt season. The big guns are still making their seasonal bows and the form is clouded by lack of race fitness and future targets. Menorah won this last year in fine style but doesn’t get his ground today, and…

Bookmakers report 95% of all bets on the final Group One race of the British Flat season, the Racing Post Trophy at Doncaster, on John Gosden’s Foundation. The market is so often a strong guide to these two-year-old heats but I am surprised to see Aiden O’Brien’s Johannes Vermeer, beaten favourite for…

The jumps season begins in earnest this weekend with HQ’s first card of the season. Course form counts for plenty at Cheltenham and Long House Hall looks to be a potentially top-class novice chaser ready to make his mark this season. Already off the mark over fences having notched at Bangor…

Order Of St George is the only real superstar in the stayers division and his absence bodes very well for the horse that chased him home in the Irish St Leger, Agent Murphy. Consensus is he’s most at home on good to soft ground – check – and he should improve…

A full twenty runners will contest the now Group-One Champion Sprint Stakes at Ascot on Saturday. Whilst the ground is good to soft, Ascot’s straight sprint course is up on higher ground and is often dryer than the official going suggests, which gives all the market principles a chance. It’s a…

We preview Saturday’s Group-One Champion Stakes at Ascot, with a horse-by-horse analysis of the market principles. Jack Hobbs (5/4) A strong second to Golden Horn in the English Derby, John Gosden’s three-year-old enjoyed his day in the sun when running out an impressive winner in the Irish equivalent. He warmed up…

Muhaarar is a worthy favourite for Saturday’s Champions Sprint Stakes. The form of his three Group One victories this season – not to mention his Greenham Stakes win in April – has been franked time and again, ranking the best in Europe. 9/4 is short, but a repeat of his course and…

I’m yet to tip a handicapper to date, but there’s a first time for everything and I’m keen on the chances of Roger Varian’s Steve Rogers in the Cesarewich – one of the silliest races in the calendar. 34 runners – thirty four – over 18 furlongs at Newmarket. It always…

Hugo Palmer’s Gifted Master makes a quick reappearance for this mile Group Three after routing a decent field at Newmarket last weekend. He broke like a bullet and didn’t slow down, winning by a handful of lengths. Whether that took anything out of him remains to be seen but it…

Godolphin’s strong crop of two-year-olds might get better today with First Victory taken to land this fillies’ Group Three and improve on her impressive first victory over course and distance a fortnight ago. Raced just once, she had Sir Michael Stoute’s Aristocratic back in third on her maiden with a similar winning…