The handicapper's the fool

It made the handicapping system look like a joke; Iris De Balme won the Scottish National from 26lb out of the handicap. For those of you who don't understand the handicapping of racehorses, this feat is the equivalent of Charlton Athletic giving Arsenal a three goal lead and then coming back to win the game. In theory, it should be impossible. But this is horseracing where nothing is impossible and Charlie Huxley proved it by steering his mount to a 14 length victory. Charlie has made a remarkable start to his career, he narrowly beat me to the amateur title during the summer, he is an excellent rider and the horses just seem to run for him. No doubt he will turn professional next year and become one of the top jocks around.
The first day of racing seemed to go very well at Great Leighs today and sources tell me that everyone there received free food and drink to make up for the fact that most of the infrastructure at the course is not complete yet. The track seemed to be riding fair and the bends looked long and sweeping so there should be no bias to front running horses as there is at Lingfield.
My champion I Have Dreamed runs at Plumpton tomorrow (2.20) and it is hoped that he can get back to winning ways after running poorly at Kempton last time when it was later found that he had a flu virus.