Ratings update: Newmarket handicap winners ones to note

Coming between Epsom and Royal Ascot, it was a predictably quiet weekend on the domestic front, with a couple of Group 3 contests at Haydock providing the highlights but some good performances too in the handicaps at Newmarket.

Conditions were soft at Haydock which ideally suited the now French-trained mare Bateel (115 from 111), winner of the Pinnacle Stakes over a mile and a half. Ironically, her owners had switched her from David Simcock to Francis-Henri Graffard this season in the hope of finding more suitable ground for her across the Channel. She won with more in hand than her length-and-a-half margin suggests and can win in better company still under the right conditions, unbeaten on soft or heavy. The Sir Michael Stoute-trained runner-up Dubka (112 from 104+) also recorded an improved effort, no match for the winner but comfortably beating the rest.

The card’s other Group 3 contest, the John of Gaunt Stakes over seven furlongs, was contested by some smart older geldings who finished in a heap after the pace only picked up from three furlongs out, and as such the form probably won’t prove too solid. The penalised pair Jallota and Breton Rock both ran up to their best (both rated 116) in second and fifth respectively, while winner Absolutely So (114 from 112) ran marginally his best race for a while to end a spell of two years since his last success.

Elsewhere, the first day’s racing of the year on Newmarket’s July course was fairly low-key, though three of the handicaps were won by progressive types who each showed form verging on a smart level. In the three-year-old handicap over seven furlongs, a positive ride in first-time cheekpieces worked wonders for the John Gosden-trained Parfait (107 from 92) who routed his field by upwards of seven lengths after making all the running. The Godolphin colours were also carried to success by four-year-old Culturati (111 from 99+) in the six-furlong handicap, a notable performance given the Charlie Appleby-trained colt hadn’t run since winning his last two starts as a two-year-old. He’ll be one of the better-handicapped runners under a penalty if turned out again for the Wokingham at Royal Ascot a week on Saturday.

At the other end of the distance scale Northumberland Plate entry Jaameh (110p from 102) is going from strength to strength for Mark Johnston and followed up his recent Chester success more easily than his winning margin (a head) suggests in the mile and three-quarter contest. Best at the weights here was Cape Cova (114 from 111) in third who improved plenty from last month’s reappearance.

Over in France it was the last big meeting for the jumpers at Auteuil until the autumn. David Pipe and Paul Nicholls had won the last two runnings of France’s most valuable hurdle, the Grande Course de Haies d’Auteuil, and this year it was the turn of Nicky Henderson with L’Ami Serge (161 from 157§) who had looked a doubtful stayer beforehand. He’d been proving expensive to follow until winning at Sandown on the final day of the British season, but he’s turned into a high-class hurdler since stepping up from two miles and the application of a hood helped him settle much better in Sunday’s race over an extended three miles and a furlong.

Across the Atlantic the final leg of the Triple Crown, the Belmont Stakes, went to the Kentucky Derby sixth Tapwrit (123 from 115). Kentucky Derby also-rans filled the next three places in a race that was lacking both the Churchill Downs winner Always Dreaming (124) and the Preakness winner Cloud Computing (121). The American three-year-old crop is still looking for a clear leader, therefore, though bear in mind that this time last year Arrogate had only recently shed his maiden tag.