The wait is over for the Eclipse
Tonight sees the opening round of the PGR Eclipse from Nottinghan. This £20K to winner event features some of the biggest stars on the open race circuit and is previewed by Jonathan Hobbs and Joe Conneely.
By the heats. . .
Heat 1
Heat 2
Heat 3
Heat 4
Heat 5
Heat 6
Following a busy weekend
A SUPER Sunday saw heats of three Category One competitions kick off.
Crayford staged heats of the Jay & Kay Coach Tours Gold Collar and Ladbrokes Grand National, while earlier in the day Towcester hosted six heats of the English Puppy Derby.
Fastest at Towcester over the 500m trip was the Maxine Locke-trained Ballymac Kobe in heat five as he followed up his trial stakes win the previous week by making all from Con Condon’s Bombay Bingo by almost six lengths in a standard-setting 28.88.
The victory completed a double in the Puppy Derby heats for the in-form Romford handler after her Ballymac Blanco made virtually all in heat two as he led home the equally fast-starting Skeard Josie of Jimmy Fenwick’s in 28.99 for the one lap.
Roy Peckham’s Winscale Wonder matched Ballymac Kobe’s fastest sectional on the day when a 4.08 split set up an all-the-way win in heat one in 29.10, while there were impressive wins from both Mark Wallis’s Newinn Cloud (29.02) and Paul Young’s Bombay Birch (28.92) in heats four and six respectively.
Heat three was declared void when the hare was stopped in the interests of safety – Farneys Mate, Thor Odinson and King Jackson ultimately went into the hat for the draw for the semi-finals which take place at the Northamptonshire track on Sunday.
At Crayford, Nathan Hunt and Ricky Holloway took training honours in the Jay & Kay Coach Tours Gold Collar and Ladbrokes Grand National heats respectively.
Hunt struck with Oaks second Icemans Girl, who finished well to Slick Sabo in heat two in 33.78, while the winner’s kennelmate Allowdale Cazoo also scored a narrow victory in heat five at the expense of John Mullins’ Wrighty.
Allowdale Cazoo has a good Crayford record as winner of the Peter Bussey Memorial Trophy earlier this year.
Fastest heat winner was the consistent Aayamza Sydney, most recently a finalist in both the Champion Stakes at Romford and Birmingham Cup at Perry Barr.
The John Mullins-trained runner produced a typically powerful performance to race away from his rivals from the fourth turn for a fastest-of-the-night 33.56 win.
Other Gold Collar heats went to Darren Whitton’s strong-running local hope Moaning Rossi (33.81) in heat one, Tony Welch’s all-the-way heat three winner Savana Moo (33.84) and Monmore’s Bangon The Clock who struck impressively for Richie Taberner in a slick 33.58.
Ricky Holloway will have all six runners in Sunday’s second semi-final of the Ladbrokes Grand National after his kennel won three of the four heats.
Holloway’s trio of winners were Patterdale Zorro (23.51), Harlequin Ernie (23.58) and Signet Harper (23.58), with the four-timer foiled by the Barry O’Sullivan-trained Traceys Sydney (23.55).
In total, Holloway has eight of the 12 semi-finalists – with six of his doing battle together in the same semi at the weekend.
The following video has been circulating on social media since Sunday night when trap five runner Step Junior opted to take a particularly fast break from trap five in the first race at Clonmel.
