Hugo Palmer blog: 'He's capable of running a nice race'

Hugo Palmer is back with an exclusive Coral blog, with the leading trainer running us through his runners on Saturday at Redcar and Windsor.

I’d have to say Order Of Malta has become disappointing if I’m totally honest, because at one time I did think he was going to become quite a nice horse, and at the moment he’s struggling to be average. He’s a very good-looking horse, and he has plenty of size about him, but he just has his own way of doing things, so he certainly isn’t the easiest horse to train, but the ability is certainly there. 

He goes down in grade again here, and his mark has dropped down into the 60’s for the first time, so he’s certainly handicapped to go well if he’s on a going day. He’s a Lope De Vega with massive feet, so he wouldn’t mind a bit of cut in the ground if there was some rain around at Redcar this weekend, so we’ll keep our fingers crossed.

I really don’t know what happened to Under The Sun at Ascot last time because I went there full of confidence that he’d run a really decent race. He was a bit lit up for the first furlong, then he nearly ran off the track at Swinley Bottom, and he was just out of the race from there and it was an absolute disaster. We’ve gelded him since then, so hopefully he’ll settle a bit better now, and we’ve actually put a hood on him Saturday, and we are going up slightly in trip, so I’m just hoping the combination of the hood and being gelded just takes the edge off him a bit. 

He’ll need to settle to stay the trip, but I’m hopeful that he will, and I think the smaller field will help him as things will be much less complicated than at Royal Ascot last time. I’m not exactly sure what to expect from him, but hopefully he’ll run a race with plenty of encouragement and we can start to rebuild his career from there because he’s a horse I’ve always thought plenty of.

Pitney just got behind on a very deep track in the racing league last time at Wolverhampton, and I’d say he performed much better than the result would suggest. He hasn’t been too lucky with the draw here in stall 10, but hopefully things go our way. I think a turning track is important to him too, so if he can overcome that slightly tricky draw then I think he’s capable of running a nice race.

His best effort on turf so far came on soft ground off this mark at Chester back in June, so I wouldn’t mind a bit of rain at Windsor for Pitney. Having said that, I probably wouldn’t run Under The Sun earlier on the card if there was too much rain, so I’ll be careful what I wish for.

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