Saturday's Selection

Horizontal Speed was disappointing for us earlier this week at Cheltenham. He travelled well again but he was off the bridle a lot earlier than he was on his previous visit to the track and he folded tamely into 7th. He is probably over the top at this stage and he will be one to keep an eye out for next season once the handicapper drops him a  few more pounds.

It is Grand National day at Ayr tomorrow and Mouse Morris is looking to make it a hat trick of big race wins with Folsom Blue, currently a 16/1 shot. I'm not sure he has the necessary stamina for this 4 mile slog though, and the one I like is former Eider hero Milborough. He is trained just a stones throw from the track by Ian Duncan and he looks as though he has been trained with this race in mind.

This 10yo son of Milan has failed to get his head in front since that Newcastle win, and he fell in this race on his next start. He then travelled to Punchestown where he was a well beaten 10th and he was subsequently sent on his summer holidays. His reappearance at Carlisle back in November came in a 20f handicap hurdle and he was never likely to shine over that trip. He had another run back over fences at Newcastle (23.5f soft) before heading back there for another crack at the Eider.

When he won that race back in 2015 he was running off a mark of 134, but he was 6lb higher for this year's renewal. He ran a decent race back in 7th but he was beaten over 40L and he may well have needed the run as it was his first run back after a couple of months off. The handicapper generously dropped him 5lb for that effort, and he showed that there is life in the old dog yet with a cracking run at Carlisle last time when he was a staying on 2nd beaten less than 3L (24.5f good to soft).

He has been nudged back up to a mark of 137 after that superb effort but that is only 3lb higher than his Eider winning mark and he is surely capable of running a big race back up at 4m. He does nothing but stay all day and on the likely soft ground tomorrow stamina will be the main attribute needed to win this race. Milborough has it in spades and if his jumping holds together he is capable of running a good race at huge odds.

STEVOS' SELECTION: 4.10 AYR-MILBOROUGH E/W 40/1