PRINCE LETS HIS CROWN WOBBLE

Jeremy Grayson focuses on the ups and downs of the summer jumps learning curve

- Jeremy Grayson

MARKET RASEN, June 14 (Good, good to soft in places) 2m1f43yds (+201yds) 0-120 Handicap Chase (Class 4)

The rain hadn't arrived in anywhere near the quantities feared ahead of this evening fixture, so instead it was a tardy round of jumping which proved most terminal to GOWER PRINCE's chances, mistakes three and two out far from his only ones but doing the most to amplify the margin of defeat. Tidy enough when making a successful chasing debut around Wincanton, perhaps Nigel Twiston-Davies's son of Yorgunnabelucky has since become a little complacent in the hood that was being deployed for the seventh straight contest here, and there seems little to lose in trying another headgear sort.

A mark currently 10lb higher than that of the aforementioned success doesn't actually appear that prohibitive set against his peak achievements, then or subsequently, and a contest of today's magnitude on a suitably sound surface should prove well within compass if slicker again over his obstacles.

NEWTON ABBOT, June 14 (Good, good to firm in places) 2m167yds (+57yds) Mares' Novices' Hurdle (Class 4)

Although beaten almost twice as far as when occupying the same third place in another mares' novice 16 days prior, HURST HILL likely achieved at least as much and certainly settled better. Handicapping can enter the reckoning now for Seamus Mullins' daughter of Arctic Cosmos, owner-trained when too weak to last home in a pair of pointing bumpers for James Young last winter but evidently strengthening up ever so gradually. The winning exploits of the dam and one of her half-siblings suggests she'll find opportunities over at least 2m2.5f (a frequently used race distance at Newton Abbot, of course), and unless the proximity of the underperforming 106-rated runner-up here is taken too literally she ought to find herself on the sort of mark that enables participation in very winnable 0-100 mares' handicaps.