Summer Plate 2017The Summer Plate never fails to get the jumping beans going so early on in the season. We look at the 2017 running, highlighting ones to avoid and ones to follow!
Due to the season starting so early, the summer plate for me, is the first big chase prize to pop on the trainers CV for the season. The prize of £28,475 will be on every trainers radar, and a high class field go to post in what looks a very tough renewal. Past winners of the race include a couple of my old favourite horses, in Yes Sir and Snoopy Loopy (2008 Betfair Chase winner)!
Henryville is the best horse in the race, on what he has achieved over fences to date. The weight for me tomorrow rules him out, with a burden of 11st 12lbs to carry. There looks better handicapped horses and was held by Days Of Heaven last time out. His running style is admirable, staying on in dogged fashion, but a line is put through the Harry Fry charge. Peter Bowen has collected the prize a few times in this race, however Wadswick Court doesn't look to have the ability to win the race. The racing world admires Dan Skeltons efforts so far as a trainer and the Warwickshire stable could have Shelford featuring at the business end come 3.25pm tomorrow. With Shelford ability, I would like to see more from the novice before following in a race of this calibre. He is still learning and I would expect Shelford to collect a nice prize later in the season. Casino Markets had a solid campaign in the 2016/2017 season, winning 3 out of 8 starts and not coming outside the top 4. I would have liked for the Emma Lavelle 9yo to have had a recent run. Casino Markets, is another who I believe will have a few races in him throughout this season and is best left alone against some of the opposition today. There are two very interesting runners tomorrow that I am wary about in terms of ability. One being It's A Gimme and also the Ian Williams trained Poker School. It's A Gimme had a much improved run at Stratford last time out when finishing behind Forever My Friend, who has been a decent yard stick for the summer jumps campaign so far. Two runs ago, he came behind one of the selections today and was well held. Lightly weighted however, and could improve to feature, but for me, would need to improve ten pound to be collecting the price. Poker School's win at Kempton on boxing day was very impressive. A horse who was in the minds of many for Cheltenham Festival success, didn't feature come March and turned up in a hurdle race at the April meeting. A reasonable run at Sandown before a poor showing last time out, there is something about the 7yo, which keeps niggling out at you. Well weighted, yard in form and has the ability. The only reason for opposing Poker School, is that he still lacks experience over fences in these sort of races. Days Of Heaven and Alcala are tomorrows selections in what looks a touch contest. Days Of Heaven has been very impressive over fences so far and there is still more improvement in him yet. Since a disappointing 2016 Coral Cup run, he has taken much better to fences as anticipated and now has an official rating of 151. The track will suit tomorrow I expect Days Of Heaven to improve again tomorrow to challenge to take the prize. As for Alcala, the team from Ditcheat are fantastic in big races like this. His last two wins on bare form aren't very strong and he does jump efficiently, albeit a little exuberantly. I think that Alcala has scope to run a brave race tomorrow and if he can settle in behind the leaders and settle (Fast pace expected), he certainly has the ability to feature. |
1 PT - Each Way - Days Of Heaven 9/1 Best Priced
1 PT - Each Way - Alcala
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