Take your seats for the Film Festival
Pontefract racegoers can get their day off to a good start on Wednesday by following the Brian Ellison trained Film Festival in the opening handicap contest at 2.10pm. This is a class 5 event over ten furlongs for amateur riders and this seven-year-old gelding comes into the race in terrific form. His last four outings have produced two wins and two seconds and his victory last time out in the Northern Derby at Carlisle was particularly impressive.
He made all the running that day, setting a decent gallop and keeping on strongly to score by four lengths from Graceful Descent. That was a far more competitive race than this, and despite having to shoulder a six-pound penalty for that success, he is potentially still well handicapped. In fact, he achieved a rating above 90 not so long ago so a mark of 67 should hold no fears.
Holiday Cocktail looks likely to be the one to chase him home. John Quinn’s eight-year-old has won three times over this course and distance and on current evidence, looks in good shape. Having made a slow start to the season, he looked to be running into form on his penultimate outing, which came in a handicap at Ayr. Travelling well throughout, he failed to quicken inside the final furlong but was far from disgraced in finishing fifth behind Marjury Daw.
Back here at his favourite venue last time, he improved again and looked all set to score when leading inside the final furlong. However, on this occasion, the stiff uphill finish appeared to find him out and Northside Prince passed him in the final few strides. A similar effort should put him into the frame and it is also worth noting that he did win this race back in 2008.
Another one who loves it around this track is Neville Bycroft’s Umverti. Like Holiday Cocktail, she has recorded three victories here, the last of which came in the middle of July when she made all the running to account for Chilly Filly by just under three lengths. Raised five pounds for that success, she returned to this track nine days later in a bid to follow up.
When she quickened away from her opponents with just two furlongs left to run, she looked destined to succeed. However, like many others before her, she found the uphill climb to the line too much to handle and appearing to tread water in the final strides, Gulf Coast agonisingly went by her in the shadow of the post. Being such a game performer, she is sure to have her supporters here, but is far from certain to be able to get to the front early on, which she undoubtedly prefers.
Pat Haslam will be hoping for a change of luck for his runner River Ardeche. When this gelding last visited Pontefract at the beginning of July, he would surely have won a ten furlong handicap but for meeting trouble in running. On that occasion, he found himself stuck behind a wall of horses and when pulled to the wide outside, he fairly flew inside the final furlong. However, the line came just a few strides too soon and he had to settle for the runner-up position behind Monkton Vale.
On his final outing at Hamilton, many punters backed him as though defeat was out of the question and he started the heavily supported 7/4 favourite. His jockey that day came in for some criticism after the race as many people thought he had given the horse too much to do. Held up in the early stages, he made good late headway into second place, but was unable to claw back the eventual winner High Resolution, who had already quickened away from the field. Given his style of running, he will be doing his best work late on and could well run into a place once again.
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