Tom Scudamore looking forward to Moment at Ascot
Over the last few days I’ve spent three afternoons as a pundit on CoralTV and thoroughly enjoyed it. When you’re suspended it’s really handy to have something to do, and with the girls at school, it was nice to keep busy and do something different, and gave me an excuse to watch all the racing which was good. It was constructive and I also enjoyed myself.
They are a nice group of people at CoralTV’s Milton Keynes studio, it’s always a friendly atmosphere and they make me feel very welcome when I go there. Television is something that one day I would really like to go into, so it’s great to have some practice and get some experience while I’m still riding.
When I watch racing broadcasts I often wonder if the ex-jockeys could be used more to explain and bring to life race-winning or losing manoeuvres in the way that football and cricket analyses and explains events before, during and after matches. Sometimes you have situations where you watch a football match and you think a defender was at fault for a goal, only for the ex-footballer pundit to explain why that defender was actually trying to cover for another player’s mistake, and it wasn’t his error. That level of insight is really good for the viewer.
You could do much more of this for analysing jockeys, and their rides, perhaps to explain why a jockey made a particular move in a race or went a particular route in a finish, as the ex-jockeys would be able to provide insight that maybe viewers wouldn’t appreciate.
The constraints on time because of adverts may make it difficult to do this type of detailed analysis on Channel 4 Racing to some extent, whereas football has before and after the match, and cricket has several breaks for lunch and tea, as well as before and after. But perhaps the Racing channels have more scope to use jockeys even more? AtTheRaces does some good analysis with some of the ex-jockeys, and there was an excellent piece with Ruby Walsh and Oli Bell on RacingUK recently. It’s definitely something I think there could be even more of.
It’s wonderful news that Hereford is to be re-opened, and Martin Cruddace appears to have changed things at ARC and they seem to be showing more of a commitment towards Racing. Bringing Hereford back will be very popular. My grandparents lived twenty minutes away from Hereford and my brother trains near there. It’s a great track, I’ve had loads of winners around there, and I’m really looking forward to riding there again later this year.
David has had a quiet few days in terms of runners because of the heavy ground, and abandonments, and he only has three tomorrow with one, Shotavodka, heading up to Haydock, one being ridden by a claimer and my mount What A Moment at Ascot. I could have had a couple more rides up at Haydock if I’d gone there but I thought What A Moment was the best chance of a winner and I don’t mind having just one ride if it’s a good ride. I would be very disappointed if he wasn’t in the first three. You always would like more but sometimes you end up with six and other times you have just one, but the most important thing is to be on horses with a chance.
Ascot will suit What A Moment a lot more than Fakenham did last time. It wasn’t enough of a test of stamina for him. He’s run fine, and he’s improving, so there is still more to come from him. He may not quite have the form of the favourite Duke De Champs but I think there is more to come. My horse improved from Sandown to Fakenham and I think he’ll improve from Fakenham tomorrow simply because of the track.
It’s been a pretty good week to miss as I would have been at Chepstow yesterday, Wincanton the day before and Newbury on Wednesday and all three meetings were called off.
On Sunday I have three rides at Fontwell. Two rides for Colin Tizzard and one for David.
I ride Third Act in the 2.40pm. He was disappointing at Lingfield but I think he wants better ground than he got there, and it will be very soft on Sunday.
Taj Badalandabad my ride in the 3.15pm ran OK last time out and is dropping in class so I think he’s got a big chance. He’s my best ride of the day.
I’m on Tikkapick in the 3.40pm and he was running ok last time. Colin has found a good race for him here, it’s not a great race at all, and if he runs as well as he was running last time he will be bang there.
Tom
