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RICHARD HUNNISETT: the new training regime paid off in style
photo: Alex Harris

"I'm the lightest I've been for years!" proclaimed a delighted Richard Hunnisett after taking the Mens Open on his Denvale.

Richard, a noted bon vivant, admitted that his preparation consisted of a week of early nights, a comment which had trainer Gerald Bailey immediately declaring "He must have had a pretty girl with him, then!"

Richard had another reason for celebration. "I was going to ride at North Carlton tomorrow so I cancelled my tickets for the Quorn hunt ball [that evening]," he said, "but now I've resurrected them."

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The 8yo&up Maiden went to Robert Fuller's Whistle Blowing, who had been qualified in Cheshire prior to joining Matt Smith's yard nine weeks ago. "He was very burly when he came - you can see he's a good doer," pointed out Matt, who had handed the reins for this race to Sussex-based Jody Sole.

"The owner wants to run him in the Military Gold Cup," Matt explained, "and as it can be difficult to find a decent rider for that we're hoping Jody [a former member of the King's Troop RHA] will want to keep the ride."

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"I was thinking about joining the T.A., but then found out that Gregor Kerr joined up and was sent to Iraq, so I thought b....r that!" Matt decides that forgoing a winning ride is a better option than enlisting for Army service.

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Bridget Andrews, 16, rode a polished race to open her account in the Dodson & Horrell Novice Riders' race on Inishturk, trained by her father Simon. Like her elder sister Gina, Bridget is a graduate from pony racing, in which she enjoyed great success.

Inishturk was picked out at the sales by owner David Gibbon's wife Lucy (nee King), the former dual national ladies' champion. "I was looking at another horse," he smiled, "but Lucy insisted on this one. She's the expert so this is the one we bought." The lightly-raced 11-year-old won a Kempton hurdle for David when trained by Alan King, and it was the latter's stable jockey Choc Thornton who recommended that Inishturk would benefit from a drop to Pointing.

The Gibbons' last winner was in 2008 with Arctic Sun, who gave Alex Merriam, now booting home the winners as a conditional, his final ride between the flags.

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"The Funny Farm" seems an unlikely training location for producing winners, but that is how Derek Harding-Jones describes his yard. Derek saddled Tony and Karen Exall's Mid Div And Creep, who loves it round Horseheath, in the Ladies' Open, and the mare duly scored her fifth course victory in the hands of Kelly Smith. "She was crazy when she came here, but she sees activity with the dogs all the time and she's completely changed," said Derek, whose sons run the London & Essex boarding kennels at his Kent's Farm premises .

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Polly Gundry's trip from Devon went unrewarded when Takotna decanted Claire Allen in the Ladies' Open and escaped the confines of the course. She was eventually recaptured, seemingly unscathed, some distance away. The seven times champion had brought her charge to Cambridgeshire because joint-owner Ian Payne lives only 30 miles from Horseheath. "He backed Mrs Be when I won the Horse & Hound Cup on her at Stratford [in 2005]," smiled Polly, "and said that he'd like to have a horse with me some time."

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Sheila Crow and Richard Burton have an outstanding record at the Cambridgeshire track, and their strike rate improved further courtesy of Fresh Fruit in the Restricted. The Crow-bred mare, whose granddam Fruit Farm won 13 races, is owned by David Rogers, who was more impressed with Sheila's training ability than her navigating expertise, although she strongly refuted his assertion that her directions to the course were marginally off target!

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On a day when temperatures struggled to get above freezing, several trainers and jockeys were far from impressed by the positive going report given in the morning by the clerk of the course to Talking Point, which is obliged to broadcast the information it is given. Many horses, some of whom had travelled a long distance, remained on their lorries after connections had walked the course and considered there was still frost in the ground. The fence at the bottom of the downhill stretch was, in fact, omitted all afternoon.

The young horse Maiden suffered the most from non-runners, and just two went to post. The match was run at a funereal pace, with Castledockrell mainly outjumping Katepast to score narrowly. "We were going to run him at Higham last week but he got a slight knock when breaking the back rail schooling at home, so we left him a week," explained owner-rider Andrew Pennock. Castledockrell had been very nervous when first joining the Pennocks, and Andrew was quick to credit his wife Ruth with getting the seven-year-old settled.

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The Club Members' race went to Clare Hobson on her mother Rosemary's Irish Rebel, who was a wild card entry in Ascot's June Derby Sale just two days after winning an Irish Point at Kinsale.

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