Marvellous!

Just about sums up our feelings all round as Shades of Midnight shrugged off a 13lb hike in the weights to run out a very impressive winner of the Craigie Cup hurdle race, which was the feature of Ayr's Saturday card yesterday.

Ridden with lots of confidence by Callum, who earlier in the day had a winner for Brother Ali (W Six Times), Shady was settled in second but off the pace set by Ewart's grand campaigner Sa Suffitt. At the end of the back straight, both course specialist Yes Tom and Shady joined the leader until, after jumping 3 out, Callum put the race to bed, riding the gelding to lead by a couple of lengths and staying on strongly.

That's Shades of Midnight's fifth career win in all, and we'll no doubt be faced by another rise in the handicap by 2-3 lbs., so a step up in class is inevitable. He doesn't have the action of a soft ground horse, and we'd always been of the opinion that there would be a little to come on better ground when stepped up to 3 miles. Maybe a staying hurdle at either the Aintree or Ayr National meetings will be on the agenda.

Meantime, a brilliant season so far for a special horse!

Shades of Midnight (Garry)

Sedgefield a possible outing for Paper Roses on Tuesday

While we all recover from an exhilarating weekend -Shades of Midnight, Callum riding his first double of his career - we can't forget that we've a promising mare in Paper Roses, with whom we do want to try and win a mare's bumper whist she remains eligible for these types of race.
Sedgefield hosts such an event on Tuesday, but we'd be a little concerned about running her in testing ground - but if the rain keeps away then we'll run. 

Paper Roses leads Tomahawk Wood