Climate change has a lot to answer for. Melbourne is so tropical now, hot and humid, with thunderstorms in the afternoon. It feels as if the whole town has moved 1000 km north. I’m still feeling tentative, and the forecast for 50 mm of rain overnight is not encouraging. I don’t know how much Flemington copped, but it’s very squelchy underfoot down at the parade ring and the rubbish bin for my lunch scraps is half full of water. It doesn’t inspire much confidence. Mister Milton’s flowerpot doesn’t inspire much confidence either. I enquire as to whether he’s a biter, but it seems he doesn’t bite strappers and prefers to nibble on himself. Maybe that’s why he’s 150/1? Compare him with The Cat. Now, there’s a fine head! The times for the first few races aren’t too bad and vary from Slow to Good until I eventually decide that the track is probably a genuine Dead. Probably bettable.
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- Flowerpot
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- Apache Cat
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- Hay List wound
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- Hay List
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- Black Caviar
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- Spiffy
The Lightning Stakes is an interesting race. Hay List looks physically impressive and the leg wound that I tried to photograph in the spring looks to have healed up OK. Apparently he jumped into a water trough and lifted a flap of skin on his off foreleg. The mare Black Caviar looks well, with some improvement to come, and Warm Love, who I’ve backed twice recently, looks very smart in those spiffy ear muffs. My selections are Hay List to beat Black Caviar and Warm Love. The mare is a bit short at $1.00 for the place so the question is who to back for second – Hay List at $1.50 or Warm Love at $7.30? With minus 30 seconds to go, while they are still mucking around with King Pulse, I go for Hay List. The mare wins by a street from Hay List, with another street to a dogged Warm Love. At least Hay List payed more for the place than the mare for the win, but I’m very disappointed that the dividend is chopped to $1.40. I’m even more disappointed when checking the TAB website to find the dividend declared as $1.50 and I was payed at $1.40!
Not much other action to report. I backed a loser (Goldstone) and a winner (Rubinacci) for the sake of exercising my money.
When will it stop raining? I need to speak to Al Gore.