Walkon not a certain runner for Newbury

Walkon

Alan King has still to make his mind up whether Walkon will take his place in the line-up for the totesport Trophy at Newbury on Saturday.

King, who has four possible runners among the 24 runners still engaged in the race, will wait until he has worked the horses on Wednesday before he finalises plans and admits that he faces a dilemma with Walkon.

The six-year-old, who has yet to finish out of the first two in seven starts over hurdles, had been off the track since winning the Grade One Anniversary 4-Y-O Novices' Hurdle at Aintree in April 2009 but came back with a promising performance at Ascot last month.

Running in a Grade Two handicap at Ascot, Walkon led on the run-in and was just touched off near the line by Tiger O’Toole. Walkon was raised 6lbs by the handicapper for that performance but gets into the Newbury race on his old mark of 148, which makes King keen to take the opportunity that has been handed to him. Speaking on his website, the trainer said: “I want to run Walkon, especially as he is 6lb well in, but the bounce factor worries me and, ideally, we would have liked another week.”

Walkon worked on the five-furlong uphill all-weather strip at King’s Barbury Castle yard with Salden Licht, who is joint-topweight for the race with Nicky Henderson’s Solix, while Iolith and The Betchworth Kid, King’s other two Newbury runners, followed in their slipstream.

“We have only had three weeks since Walkon made his comeback at Ascot, which is the bare minimum, and, though he worked well on Saturday, I want to see how he breezes on Wednesday before making a final decision,” King explained.

“Vinnie, the lad who rides Walkon out every morning, knows him inside out and I’ll be interested in his input, too. At the end of the day, Walkon will tell us whether he is ready to run, but I’d like to see him squealing after his final gallop. If he does that, then he’ll school on Thursday, along with the others, and then it will be all systems go for Newbury.”

Turning to his other potential runners King said: “They put Salden Licht up 10lb for winning at Exeter on New Year’s Day, but I had to run him somewhere and a fistful of subsequent winners have come out of that race, including Hunterview, who bolted up at Musselburgh on Sunday.

“Salden Licht was one our worst sufferers from the muscle enzyme problem last season, and we had to miss both Cheltenham and Aintree. He bounced back to chase home Captain Chris at the back-end, but he is a much better horse this season, having had the summer off, and he showed the benefit of that break when winning on the Flat at Doncaster and again when going back there and finishing an excellent fifth in the November Handicap.

“We always thought that Iolith was one of our best novices, but he probably took longer to acclimatise that we thought and he has looked a different horse this year, having been gelded through the summer. He will have to step up on what he has done, but he was a Group horse on the Flat in Germany and he always worked like a class act at home.

“That just leaves The Betchworth Kid, who is something of an enigma. He could run a stormer as he will be suited by what is usually a fast run race, and you can forget his run at Kempton in January as he made a horrible mistake at the third and frightened himself. He has schooled well since and deserves to take his chance.”

King will not decide on jockey bookings until after he has made his mind up about Walkon, but if all four do run he indicated that Robert Thornton and Wayne Hutchinson will ride Walkon and Salden Licht, leaving Sam Thomas for Iolith and Jimmy McCarthy to ride The Betchworth Kid.

Paul Wheeler

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