Gordon Brown – Race Reporter
Gordon has a wealth of experience of racing through his background in the written and broadcast media. His current principle role is reporting and supporting the scene in Scotland on Racing TV and relaying the latest news with Scottish angles.
DUAL champion jockey Oisin Murphy rode his first winner at Hamilton Park on Sunday to move ten ahead of William Buick as he closes in on a third successive Flat title.
The Irishman made all on 16/5 chance Trusty Scout to land the Big Drew Hunter Memorial Selling Stakes by a length and three-quarters.
Speaking after the winner was bought back in at the subsequent auction for £10,000, Murphy said: “That was just my fifth ride here and it’s my first visit for a few years. I looked at some of this horse’s earlier form in Ireland and saw he had made the running so that made my mind up today.
“It’s a lovely fair galloping track and you can get horses into a nice rhythm. William wasn’t riding today but we are both going to keep busy this week and right until the end of the season.”
Albegone was an easy winner at Musselburgh seven-days earlier and he followed up in equally emphatic style in the Members Of Hamilton Park Racecourse Handicap.
Tim Easterby’s speedster holds entries this week at Redcar and Newcastle and winning jockey David Allan said: “You’d want to be running him again soon after winning twice like that! Fitting him with blinkers has been the main key but he’s clearly in tremendous form.”
The final race went to Iain Jardine and Andrew Mullen with Haveyoumissedme and the pair team up on several occasions on Monday at the same Lanarkshire venue.
They are represented by Smart Lass in the Sodexo Party Nights @hamiltonpark Veterans Handicap as the mare bids to win her first race away from Musselburgh.
She is up against twelve rivals including Where’s Jeff, who has been third on two recent visits to Hamilton Park for Mick and David Easterby.