Chepstow is today undergoing a precautionary inspection at 8 am, following the large amount of rain on Saturday evening. The clerk of the course, Tim Long feels that the 11 millimeters of rain they had last night was more than forecasted, which is why an inspection has been called for.

Though the forecast is for a warm day with slight chance of rain, they hope that the forecast will not be wrong again. I have heard that today’s meeting at Newcastle was waterlogged even after their 8 am inspection yesterday.

On the contrary, Sylvester Kirk hopes that his plans to miss the next weekend’s Solario Stakes works out well when Talking Hands lines up at Ripon today. This trainer from Upper Lambourn made this decision as he feels that the Ripon Chamion Two Yrs Old Trophy 2008 is a much better opportunity for his horse than the Esher track Group Three event.

In fact, I think that Talking Hands will be in his top form while racing at the North Yorkshire venue. He had managed to chalk up a hat trick with a listed success over seven furlongs at Ascot last month.

Paul Hanagan has been booked for the ride as he is not only a good jockey, but knows Ripon much better than Sylvester. Even David Simcock feels that the Listed is more winnable, and is thus saddling his Dewhurst entry Desert Phantom for the race. Desert Phantom has a great unbeaten two starts in Windsor and Haydock.