Flat Season Comes to an End! What a five months!

The Flat season officially came to an end on Saturday at Ascot Champions Day. Unfortunately for us we didn’t end in the style I would have hoped.

There were some shock results with 200/1 and 100/1 winners for Group 1 contests.

I was gutted to see Estrange crossing the line with running left in the Fillies and Mares to finish in the runner-up spot. I think ten furlongs where she will get a strong pace would be much more suitable for next year. The tactical race didn’t favour us, but she ran a solid race in defeat. Field Of Gold was rather flat running on the wing from stall 14 on a day where you wanted to be drawn low. He is another I would like to see down in distance next year to seven furlongs – that’s always played on my mind since his two-year-old days.

Ombudsman continued a day to forget with a second to Calandagan. He was beat fairly, although the extreme hold up tactics didn’t really work. I am not a fan of William Buick at the Ascot track, that is something I will keep in mind for next season at the Royal meeting and on Ascot’s round track in general. He seems to struggle getting a position and I expect if you asked him, he would say he prefers Newmarket. Calandagan is a monster though, and a worthy winner, but it’s the first time I have seen Ombudsman exposed? Possibly.

I knew our fate before the final runner in Godwinson who was drawn in stall 19. All season you have wanted to be drawn high but with the stalls switched to the far side, I should have made more of a conscious effort to consider this fact.

However, it’s unwise to dwell on a sour day when the season has been so good to us despite some harrowing hard luck stories. Still, even allowing for those bad beats – and there were plenty of them – we have come out alive and kicking with +92.3pts profit since April.

We have played exceptionally well and kept it tight over the flat season and we will delve further into the P/L info with the “end of season review”.

For now though, it’s time to get stuck into the jumps season. Be Lucky all!