Friday’s Racing Tips – Leave Of Absence’s strong recent form makes him a player at Newbury

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Unfortunately, due to work commitments, I didn't get to watch the first race. However, from the looks of it, he didn't do that well, and given that there was no money for him, it's not surprising. 

I did manage to catch the second runner and the headline selection, and I was never happy with Sean Bowen's body language. The horse seemed to be on and off the bridle in the last half mile, and jumping the last he had a length or two to make up to beat the winner, which he didn't manage to bridge. I wouldn't give up on him just yet as the winner was previously owned by JP McManus and looked like a horse with potential, and he managed to get his win today.

There's a lot of racing on tomorrow, but not a lot really stands out enough to have a bet on other than my selection at Newbury.

Rizzel's tips

Leave Of Absence 15/8 – Newbury 2.30

This is an interesting race over fences which is contested over just short of three miles. I think you can give a chance to quite a few in the lineup, but the one I ended up falling on was the Anthony Honeyball runner, Leave Of Absence.

I had this race between my selection and Ilovethenightlife, and what swayed me for my fancy was that he is unexposed over fences and at this trip. He has finished second on his two starts over fences, and there is a chance that last time out where he was thumped by 20L looks better than what it is, but I'll take the chance.

Last time out he was beaten convincingly by The Changing Man. I thought that horse had no chance of winning the Ultima last week, but it turns out that he is a very good handicapper and he ran a belter to finish second to Myretown who was streets ahead of the handicapper, so it made the heavy defeat to that horse by Leave Of Absence much stronger. Before that, LOA was behind Iberico Lord. The winner was running off the same weight, and only managed to beat him by just over a length. In hindsight, that was a good performance as Iberico Lord is a 140+ hurdler, so to get to as close as he did off level weights when he should be in receipt of over a stone and over a trip which is probably too short for him, shows the ability is there for my selection.

The drying ground looks ideal, as does the return to a left-handed track, as he does have a tendency to jump out to his left. I think we can firmly say he does stay this trip as he was 3rd in a PTP over 3m and the horses who have come out of that PTP are good stayers, with the likes of Haiti Couleurs who won the 3m 6f race at Cheltenham last week (was 8L behind Leave Of Absence).

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