WETHERBY (03 Jan 2005)

Good To Soft

1:00 Rocom Novices' Handicap Chase (Class D) (5yo+,0-120)

[off 1:01] £5,551.00, £1,708.00, £854.00, £427.00 12 fences 2m

Comments In Running OR TS RPR

1 Big Rob (IRE) B G Powell 6 11-2 J Tizzard 5/4F 107 67 129+

2 11 Caribbean Cove (IRE) R C Guest 7 10-0 3b L McGrath(3) 3/1 94 39 102

3 1¼ Brown Teddy R Ford 8 11-5 R McGrath 7/2 110 54 117

4 6 Beat The Heat (IRE) Jedd O´Keeffe 7 11-12 B Harding 7/1 117 52 118

5 3 Tunes Of Glory (IRE) D McCain 9 10-12 J M Maguire 40/1 103 34 101

6 18 Zamat P Monteith 9 11-10 T Doyle 33/1 115 21 95

6 ran TIME 4m 21.50s (slow by 29.50s) TOTAL SP 109%

1st OWNER: P H Betts BRED: Mrs Sheila O'Ryan TRAINER: B G Powell

2nd OWNER: Paul Beck

3rd OWNER: G B Barlow

TOTE WIN £2.20 PL £1.40, £1.60; Ex £6.00; CSF £5.38

ANALYSIS: Three winning chasers in a novices' handicap more competitive than the size of the field might suggest and it took a decent performance by BIG ROB, who looked more than useful as he made all and won decisively, despite having been put up 13lb for last month's Newbury success. His jockey felt the gelding was unsuited by the ground and his mount did tend to jump to the right, markedly so in the latter stages, but he scarcely made a mistake, kept on well and is clearly a much better chaser than he was a hurdler - though he is in for another hike in the weights now there is more improvement to come.

Caribbean Cove confirmed the improvement he had appeared to show in winning at Sedgefield last time with a clear second off a 7lb higher mark, even though he was unable to make any impression on the winner late on. He will be at least as effective returned to 2m4f.

Brown Teddy was taking on better opposition than when he made a winning chasing debut at Kelso in October and was not at all disgraced on this first run for 11 weeks.