Troopingthecolour

The second last race at Sandown on Saturday, the 10-furlong maiden, was only a Class 5 contest with just over £3,000 to the winner, but there were a couple of very likeable types in the race, including the third horse, Secret Life, who got no run at all through the closing stages of the race. But the one to take out of it for me was the John Gosden-trained debutant Troopingthecolour. Jimmy Fortune rode the other Gosden horse in the race, Count Lucien so, although there wasn’t that much between the pair in the betting in the end, it is reasonable to assume that Count Lucien was the stable’s first string and Troopingthecolour was expected to come on for the run.

Settled well back in the field in the early stages by Richard Mullen, and a little free down the back straight, the Nayef colt was asked to improve up the inside early in the home straight, but didn’t seem to fully realise what was being asked of him initially. At the two-furlong pole he looked to be treading water and really going nowhere, destined for a midfield finishing position, but at the furlong pole he began to run on among horses on the far side under just a hands and heels ride. Mullen switched him off heels around the leaders on the far rail inside the final furlong, and he came home really well, despite looking around him a lot and running a bit green. Once he was switched outside Laughing Boy inside the last 100 yards, however, he decided to put his head down and he ran on really well to deprive the twice-raced Secret Life of second place, and get to within a head or a neck of the winner Brooklyn Spirit.

A 230,000gns yearling, Troopingthecolour is immaculately-bred, a son of the Rainbow Quest mare Hyperspectra from that top class Meon Valley family of Reprocolor, dam of Bella Colora, that has produced so many top class performers. He should get 12 furlongs, and he is one to look forward to.

13th June 2009