The Jef­fery Ross Rac­ing Spe­cial

Di Ste­fano is napped to score in the list­ed Drag­on Stakes over five fur­longs at Sandown to­day–a penal­ty kick! That's ap­pro­pri­ate be­cause this Ba­hami­an Boun­ty colt, named af­ter the fa­mous soc­cer play­er, is trained by Mick Chan­non, a long-term Eng­lish In­ter­na­tion­al foot­baller.

Di Ste­fano achieved a ca­reer-best, when a strong-fin­ish­ing third to Strike The Tiger, in the 'Wind­sor Cas­tle' over a sim­i­lar dis­tance at Roy­al As­cot last month. None of these ri­vals will be able to match a re­pro­duc­tion of that form. I'll bet on it! Few things give me more plea­sure than watch­ing Dale Gib­son rid­ing win­ners. The thir­ty-some­thing vet­er­an climbs aboard We'll Deal Again in the Sell­ing Stakes over six fur­longs at Hay­dock and what beats them will win.

Don't wor­ry Mick (East­er­by!) JR wont be there try­ing to claim/buy, not at 24 grand! Glob­al Con­quest re­al­ly should go one bet­ter and make it third time lucky, in the Maid­en Stakes over sev­en straight fur­longs at Don­cast­er to­day, an­oth­er ven­ture North for Pat Ed­dery. The eleven-times cham­pi­on jock­ey, turned train­er, sent Con­tract Cater­er to Cat­t­er­ick on Wednes­day on a suc­cess­ful mis­sion and it would be a sur­prise, if Glob­al con­quest is ex­tend­ed, nev­er mind beat­en, un­der Adri­an Nicholls.

Last week, Glob­al Con­quest failed by a short-head to win a sim­i­lar race at Sal­is­bury, af­ter stag­ing a tremen­dous late burst. Pre­sum­ably, this time, front-run­ning tac­tics will be used, thus sort­ing out the wheat from the chaff. What's the point of a Porsche be­ing be­hind a Mor­ris Mi­nor!