Thoughts on Bailiwick today

Bailiwick makes his long awaited racecourse debut today at Wolverhampton (Saturday 27th of October). Royston Ffrench takes the ride in the in six furlong maiden. Bailiwick is a well bred son of Oratorio, being a half brother to several good winners, most notably top class sprinter Reverence. He is quite a small horse but has been slow to mature.Bailiwick has done a reasonable amount of work but is a fairly laid back character so there is still more to come. Its also a family that tend to get quicker with age, six looks on the sharp side for him in the long run at the moment but this looked like a good opportunity to get the ball rolling, if he is sharp enough to what its all about first time out he ought to go close in what looks a weak maiden.

Its a very open race with most of the runners having had a lot of goes at breaking the maiden and although La Napoule looked better dropped back to sprinting on her most recent start – something she is bred for, the less experienced horses are more interesting dangers. Qatar Princess looked a good prospect when last seen at the races a year ago and having been placed in two out of three starts certainly demonstrated the ability required to win a contest like this one, however that long absence and two changes of trainer since make it difficult to know how much of that ability is still retained. Satellite Express was third of four first time out and should improve, whilst Aphrilis has been close in a couple of similar maidens and is probably the standard setter.