Plus 1 when driving in this morning and we have had some snow overnight.

Suzanne Proctor called in to see Ascotdeux Nellerie yesterday afternoon during evening stables with a view to joining the latest Kim Bailey Racing Partnership.

Dave Tyler who is part of the A&R Racing Club Partnership called in this morning to see Fizzy Dancer.

Harry Bannister made it in to ride out a couple of lots this morning.

One runner today at Sandown with Derrintogher Bliss for our thoughts please login.

Plus 1 when driving in this morning although the wind chill is still in the minus figures.  Luckily any snow that fell yesterday afternoon has now disappeared and hopefully we won't get any more!

Knocklayde Express hated the very deep ground yesterday at Wincanton but we are glad to say she is fine this morning.

Tom Bellamy was in for a couple of lots this morning.

Mrs Perriss' new horse Queer Times arrived at Thorndale this morning.

A note for the diary Kim is doing his preview evening on the Monday night before the Cheltenham Festival at the Wheatsheaf for more information please contact the Wheatsheaf directly.

Plus 2 when driving in although the wind chill must be in the minus figures as it is raw.

We were very pleased with how Thedrinkymeister ran yesterday and turning in we thought he might just hold on to win but in the end was only beaten two lengths into third and rewarded those who logged in to 25/1 placing. He is fine this morning.

Thursday is our quieter day for the horses normally hacking around the farm but due to the mud everywhere we can't.

Today we have one runner at Wincanton for Mat's thoughts please click here.

Plus 9 and raining when driving in although it is due to get a lot colder from this afternoon.

David Bass and Harry Bannister were in to ride out this morning.  It is the first morning that David has been in since returning from injury.

One runner today at Leicester, David Bass rides and if you click here you will have Mat's thoughts on The Drinkymeister's chances.

On the non racing front Andy Murray is through to the semi-finals of the Australian Open. He plays Tomas Berdych tomorrow.

Plus 5 when driving in this morning.

Ed Cookson was in to have a look around the yard and annoy everyone.

Norman and Zoe Carter where here third lot to see their horses Rhianna, Silver Eagle, Milord, Tara's Rainbow, Sunblazer and Mor Brook. Tim Richardson was also here third lot to see his horse Knockanrawley. Peter Kerr was also here this morning.

Our vet Graham Potts was in for his usual weekly visit to catch up on things.

No runners today with Lingfield being abandoned yesterday morning due to waterlogging.  It was good to see David Bass back in action yesterday at Ludlow and to come back with an easy winner on One For The Guv'Nr which was our selection on the login page. For today's selection you will need to login here.

Plus 9 and extremely mild driving in this morning.

We don't have any runners today but what a wonderful weekend of racing with Oliver Sherwood's Many Clouds winning the BetBright Cup Chase at Cheltenham on Saturday and then Hurricane Fly winning his fifth Irish Champion Hurdle and his twenty second career Grade 1 on Sunday.

After racing on Saturday at Cheltenham they held a Brightwells Sale where Hawkhurst, a brother to Grade 1-winning hurdler Muirhead, was bought for £200,000 by Kieran McManus, son of leading owner JP.  The sale was strong with the top three lots making £150,000 and over. We managed to add to our string with Lot 10, Queer Times, for Penny Perriss.  He has won an Irish point to point and looks a nice sort for the future.

Plus 1 and dry when driving in.

Busy morning with Cheltenham Races on...

Simon Devereux, Dan Rose and Steven Crabb, Adam Phillips and Sue Duffy, Mrs Gail and John Chambers, Webster x2.. were all here for a 'Morning On The Gallops followed by Breakfast' as booked through CD Tours.   

American jockey James Stierhoff and Jane Hearn called in for a look around the yard. James has won the Maryland Hunt Cup.

Mat Lambert called in to see his horse Trojan Star, while Karen Masters called in to see her KBRP horse Knockanrawley. Peter Kerr who runs my KBRP's was also here.

Henry Kimbell brought some of his team from the GSTTKPA Charity Partnership to see their promising horses Allez Encore and King Simba.. We still have the odd share for sale so if you fancy joining please ring Henry on 07979522744.

Cracking racing at Cheltenham and Doncaster today. Dont miss watching the 1.40 from Leopardstown tomorrow .. the best 3 horse race ever?

This time last year Harry Topper was 3rd in the Cotswold Chase at Cheltenham and The Rainbow Hunter won the Sky Bet Chase at Doncaster.

A year on we have no runners at either meeting but Harry Topper is on course to run in 2 weeks time in the Denman Chase at Newbury while The Rainbow Hunter returns to action the following week.. after the Crabbies Grand National weights have been set.

For those of you who followed my insights yesterday were rewarded with a 9/2 winner in the first at Doncaster so if you fancy seeing what I think today then please click here.

Pressure is on for Mat and Kerry next week with the blog and other matters.. I am away..

Clare and I are off to Heathrow tonight to catch a flight to Johannesburg; we are away for 9 days staying with mates at their stunning Leobo Private Reserve. Please don't get too jealous!!

I should finish by saying good morning to Jeremy Deedes. Jeremy reads my blog after reading his old paper the Daily Telegraph on line.. Factual reading before his day starts while on holiday in Cape Town. Sorry not to be seeing you Jeremy.

Before I go here is a story for you to think about.....especially as I will be seeing animals next week

One morning a blind bunny was hopping down the bunny trail and tripped over a large snake and fell, kerplop right on his twitchy little nose.

'Oh please excuse me,' said the bunny. 'I didn't mean to trip over you, but I'm blind and can't see.'

'That's perfectly all right,' replied the snake. 'To be sure, it was my fault. I didn't mean to trip you, but I'm blind too, and I didn't see you coming.

By the way, what kind of animal are you?

''Well, I really don't know,' said the bunny.. 'I'm blind, and I've never seen myself. Maybe you could examine me and find out.'

So the snake felt the bunny all over, and he said, 'Well, you're soft, and cuddly, and you have long silky ears, and a little fluffy tail and a dear twitchy little nose. You must be a bunny rabbit!'

The bunny said, 'I can't thank you enough. But by the way, what kind of animal are you?'

The snake replied that he didn't know either, and the bunny agreed to examine him, and when the bunny was finished, the snake asked, 'Well, what kind of an animal am I?'

The bunny had felt the snake all over, and he replied, 'You're cold, you're slippery, and you have no balls...You must be a "POLITICIAN"

Of course David Bridgwater might have thought the same about the stewards at Ludlow!!

See you in 9 days time..

Minus 6 and dry when driving in.

Yes minus 6 was a bit of a shock and the coldest start to a morning for over a year.

Good to see Robert Fanshawe last night; Robert called in during 'evening stables' for a coffee as he was in the area..Robert works for Property Vision so he was obviously looking?

Brough Scott rang last night to talk to Liam Higgins.

Brough is one of the judges for the Godolphin sponsored Stable Staff awards and his job is to narrow the 10 down to 4 for next months finals. Brough throughly enjoyed his half hour chat with Higgs.. he felt that they should have met for a pint as the stories flowed.

Peter Scudamore rang earlier in the week to talk to Mat Nicholls; again Peters job, along with Ian Balding, is to narrow their leadership section down to 4.

I was pleased to see that Melissa Jones, who writes an excellent racing column, pick up on the story in her Gloucester Echo column.

Peter Kerr, who runs my KBR Partnerships was here for 3rd lot, along with Michael Wilkes. Michael is a share holder and part owner in 4 of our KBRP's horses...Mor Brook, Sunblazer, Un Ace and Milord.

Aiden Murphy (famous bloodstock agent) called in late morning and then he and I popped down to Cheltenham Racecourse to look at the horses who are selling after racing at the Brightwells Sales tomorrow night.

Again no runners from here today.. anyway Huntingdon is frozen off..

Ian Reid tells Bruce's story from down under where the cricket is going well as is Andy Murray

A small boy named Bruce lived in a suburb of Sydney, Australia.

None of his classmates liked him cause of his stupidity, especially his teacher, who was always yelling at him, "You’re driving me mad Bruce".

One day Bruce 's mum came to school to check on how he was doing. The teacher told his mum honestly, that her son was simply a disaster, getting very low marks, and never had she seen such a dumb boy in her entire teaching career

The mum was shocked at the feedback and withdrew her son from school and moved out of Sydney, relocating to Newcastle.

25 years later, the teacher was diagnosed with an incurable cardio disease. All the doctors strongly advised her to have heart surgery, which only one surgeon could perform. Left with no other options, the teacher decided to have the operation, which was successful.

When she opened her eyes after the surgery she saw a handsome doctor smiling down at her. She wanted to thank him, but could not talk. Her face started to turn blue, she raised her hand, trying to tell him something but eventually died.

The doctor was shocked and was trying to work out what went wrong, when he turned around he saw our friend Bruce, working as a cleaner in the clinic, who had unplugged the oxygen equipment in order to connect his vacuum cleaner.

Don't tell me you thought Bruce became a heart-surgeon?

Plus 1 and damp when driving in.

Todays discussion in the Racing Post is all about being 'Grim Up North'.

Lack of horses and lack of prize money when you go past the line of Haydock to Doncaster.

True as the likes of Sedgefield, Wetherby, Catterick, Hexham and Newcastle are a long way to go when the prize money fails to make the journey attractive.

Perth is even further away and again their prize money is not as good as it used to be.

Perth however make up for it by making their owners experience very very good and a visit is well worthwhile.

It is hard to persuade owners to make the trip North, and again when the weather is playing havoc..it is even harder to persuade them to travel North with the chance of racing being off.. all expensive stuff, as Fakenham are finding out today.

What is interesting is that Jumping's biggest home based owners are Paul and Claire Rooney who live near Kelso. 

The Rooney's, who have to be good for jump racing, have the best part of 90 horses in training; the majority of whom are based with Donald McCain

On the trainers horse numbers runners front..

Donald has run 162 individual horses, J.J O'Neill has 140, Nicky Henderson 135, David Pipe 124, Paul Nicholls 121, Philip Hobbs 114, Alan King and Nigel Twiston Davies are on 102, Venetia Williams on 100 and Lucinda Russell on 97. All bar two are Southern based.

Bizarrely of the top 25 Jumps trainers in the country only 4 are based North of Warwick and one of those is based in Ireland.

Yes the Racing Post is right in what they are saying; figures prove it.

Mrs B is on a speed awareness course in Northleach today..I wonder how many people she will know? Lunch after at The Wheatsheaf sounds a good idea?

As John Cootes has pointed out....

My Racing insights have not been upto much over the last few days; something to do with the fact that we have had hardly any runners and yesterdays selected horse deposited Jason Maguire when in front at Ayr.

As he rightly pointed out "One of the healthiest ways to gamble is with a spade and a couple of seeds".

"Someone once asked me why women don't gamble as much as men do and I gave a commonsensical reply; that we don't have as much money.

That was a true but incomplete answer. In fact, women's total instinct for gambling is satisfied by marriage"

Plus 3 and damp when driving in.

I left the yard last night, well after evening stables and it was snowing hard. I awoke this morning expecting to see a scene of white, but it had all gone.

The beauty about writing my blog before the world has started work is that factually I can get caught out, especially when I write it in the past tense..

Kevin Clancy, who was here to see his two horses The Rainbow Hunter and Crazy Jack yesterday, actually fell ill on his way here and returned home..

So those of you who were impressed that he was up so early to see his horses on the gallops should feel sorry for him. I think I know which he would have preferred?

Anyway good morning Kevin.. I hope you are feeling better today.

Graham Potts our vet was in for his weekly visit a day late.

John Perriss was over to see his horses Azure Aware, By The Boardwalk, Emily Gray, Knocklayde Express, Mollys A Diva and The Drinkymeister late morning.

We have no runners again today, in fact we have none for the rest of the week.. boring to say the least.

For those of you who have clicked to read my racing insights over the last few weeks should have been well rewarded. As we don't have any runners for you to follow we are going to offfer our outside thoughts.

Here are the last 7 puns for the educated minds.

1. If you jumped off the bridge in Paris, you'd be in Seine.

2. A vulture boards an airplane, carrying two dead raccoons. The stewardess looks at him and says, 'I'm sorry, sir, only one carrion allowed per passenger.

3. Two fish swim into a concrete wall. One turns to the other and says 'Dam!'

4. Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, so they lit a fire in the craft. Unsurprisingly it sank, proving once again that you can't have your kayak and heat it too.

5. Two hydrogen atoms meet. One says, 'I've lost my electron.' The other says 'Are you sure?' The first replies, 'Yes, I'm positive.'

6. Did you hear about the Buddhist who refused Novocain during a root canal? His goal: transcend dental medication.

7. There was the person who sent ten puns to friends, with the hope that at least one of the puns would make them laugh. No pun in ten did.