Doctor Kingsley still loving the job

 We had Paddy Geraghty in today to school a few youngsters and he had a little spin on Dr K upsides Will Seth Smith our owner rider to get him jumping at racing speed. We have entered Dr K in the members at Whitfield on Sunday as he has been feeling so well. Ironically when he was in full work and racing he was rarely on the bridle and was less than enthusiastic and now that he is supposed to be retired he is pulling my arms out and hates not going out in the string. Silly old fool. He is feeling better than ever although he has to belie his 15 years of age and a 5lb penalty to get his belligerent nose in front on Sunday. If he does a clear round we will be delighted for him as we know that he still loves the job and will be more than happy to just win best turned out in the parade ring as he is such a show off.

Doug walked Whitfield on Wednesday and was surprised it wasn't softer than it was. It is however a testing track as the bends are further out than before and it will be a good three plus miles. Nick Meek has been stood down for 10 days as he had a fall last Saturday so we won't be running Tik (Velvet Steel) and maybe not Cloud as she has a sore wither. Annoyingly our only soft ground horse, Cupachai has had a niggling foot abscess which may not be better in time. Dancer will have a plug around - She is so genuine that she will get round no matter what the ground is like.
On Monday we encountered the Racing UK camera team who were there for Ben Case's lovely mare Midnight Jazz who has got an entry for the Cheltenham festival. We arrived at the gallops with a somewhat 'Oddball' string - To be diplomatic I will just say that some of our riders on that day did not fit the typical 'jockey' look........We saw the whole of Ben's string circling around the bottom but they told us to go first which we did. Big Lenny with the bent head overtook us all and breasted the hill like the War Horse charger to be confronted with the whole camera team who obviously thought that we were Ben's string. We all bobbed past and the look on their faces was priceless. Poor Ben. I hope he has forgiven us!