Jim Crowley: ‘I’ve always felt Molatham had the pace for six furlongs.’
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Coral ambassador Jim Crowley previews his rides at York and looks ahead to Epsom Derby
Our man Jim Crowley discusses his three rides on Wednesday and gives us his thoughts on Bolshoi Ballet being the favourite for the Derby.
The Dante meeting kicks off with a typically competitive York handicap, and I’m on Taqareer.
He’s finished second on his two starts this season, the last time on Kempton’s all-weather, and we’re two pounds better off with the horse that beat us that day [My Frankel].
In hindsight I probably didn’t make enough use of him at Kempton, he stays very well and I’m looking forward to having another go on him here.
Molatham won last year’s Jersey Stakes at the Royal meeting, and then ran OK in France and at Doncaster, before ending the season over a mile at Ascot, when the very soft ground and possibly the trip found him out. We’re dropping him back to six furlongs here, which is exciting, as I’ve always felt he had plenty of pace.
As always at York this looks a really strong contest, with the July Cup winner Oxted in here, but my fellow is a high class horse and if he can run well here over this trip, that will open up so many more races for him this season.
Jadhlaan is a Shadwell home bred with a lovely pedigree, and Mark Johnston’s always know the time of the day when they make their racecourse debut, so this is another exciting ride to look forward to.
A few of these do have racecourse experience though, and of the ones to have run, Second Wind was a winner at Yarmouth, so he probably sets a decent enough standard, and we’ll certainly find out plenty about Jadhlaan here.
We’ll see more Epsom clues at York this week, with the Dante the big Derby trial here, but of the trials we’ve seen so far, I was most impressed by Bolshoi Ballet’s victory at Leopardstown last Sunday. He put in a good time, he put plenty of distance between himself and the rest, and it was a performance that fully deserved him to be made favourite for the Derby.
Watching the trials at Chester and Lingfield, and the 2000 Guineas, I didn’t see a performance that made me think, there’s a Derby winner, but Bolshoi Ballet did impress me.
We’ll have to see if anything comes out of the Dante, but I couldn’t be happier with Mohaafeth and it looks as if he will be one of the leading contenders for Epsom, in terms of the betting at least.
Jim
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