Sunday’s Nap of the Day: Carrigeen Kampala can go better than the early odds suggest 

The Caltonian travelled well for a long way yesterday, before simply finding a couple too good inside the final furlong, clinging on for a respectable third, but again, no dice. Onto Sunday. 

Plumpton is the venue of interest today, with the race taking place at 15:50 standing out as a decent opportunity for Carrigeen Kampala to get back on track following a couple of falls. 

That’s right, this horse has let her supporters down twice on the bounce, falling in a hurdle race at Newton Abbot, before also falling early over fences at the same venue three weeks ago. 

Such signs aren’t massively promising, but those falls have clearly been factored into the price here. Without them, she’d be much shorter, there’s no doubt about that. If she can remain error free, as she has done on several previous occasions, then she’ll likely go much better than early odds of 12/1 suggest. 

Clearly good enough to win races of this nature

Let’s face it, the mare looked some way ahead of the handicapper when scoring with authority over slightly further at Newton Abbot back in June, while she shot clear with ease in a Class 3 hurdle at that venue last September too, winning a race not dissimilar to this in what was seemingly second gear. She beat a 132-rated animal by a wide margin that day. 

She also won with plenty to spare over this trip at Stratford last season, doing so from a mark of 120. That form makes a mark of 124 look very workable, while the return of Jack Hogan, who has a 100% record on this horse, is a plus. Fergal O’Brien has a decent strike rate when putting Hogan in the saddle, which also should not be ignored. 

The speed rating that she generated when winning at Newton Abbot back in June is also easily better than anything else recently produced by any other runner here, again making odds of 12/1 look generous. 

Of course, plenty hinges on whether she’s feeling it following those falls, while she’ll need to stay up, but if she does, she’s got plenty going for her, far more than the early odds suggest, that’s for sure. 

In a race where none of the runners look rock-solid, with no hugely fancied early favourite, this looks like a more than reasonable opportunity for the previously progressive mare to put together a decent performance, and at 12/1, she’s worth betting on to do just that. 

Based on a £10 level-stakes example, the Nap of the Day running profit is -£120 (since switching to being published here rather than on the ‘Nap of the Day' page).

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