Back with a Winner! Point to Pointing has returned and we are so excited to be back to spending our weekends enjoying such a wonderful sport. Dunsmore was on the 5th November and we had two runners. Diamatiste made his debut in the 4 and 5 year old Maiden. He finished a very pleasing 4th and will have learnt an awful lot for this experience. We bought him from the Land Rover Store Sales in 2022 and although he was ready to run last season, the ground never played in his favour, so we decided to give him a holiday ready for this season. Longshanks made his stable debut for us in the Grassroots Conditions Race under last season’s Champion Novice Jockey, Callum Pritchard. It was all about allowing Longshanks to enjoy himself and hopefully allow him to regain some confidence. He certainly did just that and Callum gave him a lovely ride to power home in front by 8 lengths. We were delighted for his owner Richard House. Richard’s daughter also had the winner of the Mixed Open with From The Heart so it was a very pleasing day for the family. Richard has been a longstanding supporter of racing and we are thrilled to have got Longshanks back to winning ways! We headed to Badbury Rings this weekend with Paloma Blue and Love That. Blackmore Racing Club’s Love That had an educational run in the Maiden and we learnt a lot about her moving forward. Hopefully we can find a slightly slower paced race this side of Christmas for her. Paloma Blue had his first outing of the season and ran in an extremely hot Mixed Open. Josh was not hard on him and he had a good blow after. This was most certainly not his Gold Cup and we will now plot our way with him with the aim to go back to Cheltenham Hunter Chase Evening. Back with the National Hunt horses, Stratton Oakmont made his seasonal debut and finished 3rd at Warwick. His jumping was not as fluent as it could be, but the engine in him is very impressive. Hopefully one day they will both click at the same time and he will get the win that both him and his owners deserve! Iris Des Issards outran his huge odds of 150/1 at Exeter to come 4th. He finished behind some very classy horses and we hope the future is bright for him! Stellar Stream was hit with a heart defib problem last season, so it was great to see him make a pleasing Chase debut around Ffos Las in some pretty awful conditions on Sunday. Hopefully he can build on this for next time. He is one of the horses in the yard that certainly won’t mind if it keeps raining but as for the rest of us, we have had enough now!!!
Category: News
The Countdown Is On!
The Countdown Is On! Our first entries are in and we are on the final countdown to the first Point to Point of the season. Dunsmore is fairly local to us and it will be great to get back racing! We have a handful of entries made including horses from Blackmore Racing Club. With Storm Ciaran hitting the South West hard, we will take each day as it comes with the ground conditions and any possible runners. We have had more than our fair share of rain over the past couple of weeks and luckily our fields around the farm can cope with it very well which allows us to continue using them. The 3 year olds have all schooled over the fences on the grass which is brilliant. It is lovely to start seeing them progress which builds excitement for the coming few months. Josh received his Foran Equine prizes from winning the Point to Point Trainers Title last season. We are extremely grateful for these companies to sponsor the Awards and would like to thank Foran for this. Foran Equine is part of Connolly’s Red Mills, which led us to being introduced to their feed. Charlie Ward, the Thoroughbred Specialist representative, has been extremely helpful with introducing us to the company which we have now made the decision to change feeds too for the coming season. We had Arioneo in the week before last to use their Vet Equimeter on the horses. This is a device that attaches to the girth that has patented electrodes that collects exercise ECG coupled with GPS and locomotion data. It was a very interesting morning seeing the device and how it works along with the data it can produce. We have various work routines here at Blackmore Farm, so it was very helpful to understand how hard each horse works doing different pieces of work. We are hoping to have a couple of devices to hand on the yard which will be a huge positive to look into each horse’s fitness, heart rates and recovery. Longshanks has been very kindly gifted a big tub of Gut Balancer from Protexin Equine Premium. We hope it makes a big difference to his general wellbeing and will support his digestive functions and efficiency to get his results back on track. It is never too late to get involved in our very exciting Racing Club. Please do not hesitate to drop us an email or message for more information on this.
Introducing the new Blackmore Racing Club!
Introducing the new Blackmore Racing Club! September has been and gone and before we know it, we are nearly in the middle of October. The horses are all coming along nicely and we will start to have a few National Hunt entries in the next couple of weeks. Hunter Certificates have started to be submitted for the beginning of the Point to Point season, which is just over 3 weeks away at Dunsmore, near Exeter. It is a track we have had plenty of success at in previous years. We have a couple of horses that we hope to run there, including a horse from our new club, Blackmore Racing Club. We are very excited to launch the Blackmore Racing Club. It will consist of 2 or 3 horses that will run throughout the season across the South West Area. The club is open for anyone and everyone to join for a one off fee of £395 (October – June). Club members will be invited to come to the yard to meet the team and watch the horses along with breakfast rolls from The Sausage Shed. There will be weekly updates via Email or WhatsApp and plenty of fun to be had at the races along with fabulous Car Park Picnics! Did Ja Ever, a 5 year old mare who was 3rd in an Irish Point to Point, will hopefully be our first runner. It is a great way to get involved in our sport and our yard at an affordable cost and we hope you will join us in this exciting journey! The horses work routines have increased and they are all feeling very fresh and well. On the 10th October, we were lucky to have Yogi Breisner come to Chard Equestrian (pictured below) for some schooling. We took 14 horses up there for a jump under Yogi’s watchful eye. All the horses are at different stages of their careers but it was brilliant to see things come together and they all jumped well. We have also got most of our 3 year old store purchases out on the grass jumping this week, which they took to very well. We love watching their progress and look forward to them hopefully making their racecourse debuts next Spring. Nickelsonthedime had his final run of the season on the 25th September finishing 5th. The handicapper has got a big hold on his mark so he will now enjoy a well deserved holiday. If you would like any more information or to get involved in Blackmore Racing Club, please email us on info@kayleywoollacottracing.com
Open Day Success
Full steam ahead for Blackmore Farm! Blackmore Farm has been a hive of activity since our last blog. The yard is now full of horses and it is great to have all the staff back after their holidays. The majority of the horses are back cantering and have started to enjoy a jump in the school. Hopefully it won’t be long before we get them schooling on the grass. A few weeks ago, we wanted it to stop raining, but after this heatwave we will be in need of some rain again! We have had a handful of runners since our last blog. Caspers Court made his seasonal reappearance where he was slightly outclassed and would have needed the run. Our Dylan had his final run of the summer on the 1st September where he finished 3rd at Fontwell with Ben in the saddle. He will now enjoy a well deserved holiday and will come back into work in the New Year for the Spring. Dime ran another solid race at Worcester on the 12th September to finish 3rd only being beaten 2L. He has been so consistent over the summer and given his owners plenty of fun. Sunday 3rd September saw us have our annual Owners Day. With help from the staff, family and friends, we had an extremely busy day with over 130 people attending. The yard looked immaculate, as did the horses during their parades. Everyone enjoyed a beautiful lunch which was prepared by ourselves and enjoyed watching a Season Highlights video. The next couple months will consist of getting the horses back to race fitness and then we can do the exciting part of race planning! We are looking forward to having Yogi Breisner in at the beginning of October for some jump schooling, which will hugely benefit the younger horses. We were lucky enough to have Brian Stubbs Photography at our Owners Day. Photos can be viewed here.
Another Chapter
Welcome To The New Website For Kayley Woollacott Racing! I hope you can agree with me in saying that the website looks amazing, refreshed and modern. Huge thank you to Liam J. Dowler and Stephanie Jones for the design and putting it together. Blackmore Farm hasn’t had much of a rest over the summer with plenty of pressure washing and painting ready for the new season. The horses, however, have all enjoyed a lovely summer out to grass and have started trickling back into work from the end of July/beginning of August. We purchased 5 three year old stores at the Sales over the summer which have all been broken in and we very much look forward to watching their progress over the next year after the success we had with last years’ stock. We have plenty of old and new faces for this coming season, both National Hunt and in the Point to Point sphere and we very much look forward to welcoming new owners as well. Last season was a personal best with 6 National Hunt wins, 17 Point to Point wins and 2 Hunter Chase wins. To produce this from our small yard is a huge achievement and we celebrated well when Josh was crowned National Champion Trainer (6 to 14 Category) at the National Point to Point Awards at the end of the season. The 2023/2024 National Hunt season has already started very well with a successful summer campaign. Nickelsonthedime won at both Warwick and Newton Abbot while Sylvies Dance won on her rules debut for us also around Newton Abbot in June. Fingers crossed for a successful season under both codes and we will keep you all updated with the yard news fortnightly.