I guess you can say "that's racing" but today was a very disappointing day.

CENTABEEL FAILED TO stand up today and he is I am afraid a pretty restricted horse on what he has shown on the racecourse to date. Sure, I think the form will stand up out of today's race, but if he was going to go on and be a top horse - he had to be in the mix - you can't hide from promising horses in a maiden, and he failed to deliver clearly. He looked well in the yard and Troy Portelli was extremely happy with the horse going into the race, and he was travelling very well in second place to the turn. But - he was the first horse beat when the pressure went on and he was beaten out of sight. Had the race been another 40 metres he would have run sixth instead of fourth.

On today's performance he needs much, much weaker company. He is not the first horse that has hoodwinked people, as he travels very nicely on the bit (as he did again today) and delivers virtually nothing when the pressure goes on. I had a suspicion he was pretty average after his disappointing run at Newcastle, and he did nothing at Ballarat last start to changed my view. He fully franked it today.

I am weighing up the options with the horse and he may need to go to some country TAB meetings to try and get a couple of soft kills to see if that instils any confidence in the horse and we see some marked improvement. He is obviously going to get beat most times close to town if anything in the race has any promise at all.

FLAUNTER PULLED up in a very distressed state following his lacklustre fourth as a short priced favourite at Canberra today. The horse seems like he could be siffering the effects of a virus and trainer Colbey Hill will monitor the horse and report back to me tomorrow. Tommy Berry told Colbey that he travelled beautifully in front but failed to quicken when expected and it appears all is not well with the horse.

VAL DE LA DIVA led to the turn in her race at Orange but found little in the run home. Shehas never led in her life, but she got the lead softly so that cannot be used an excuse. It was never my intention to race beyond the end of the season and she will have one or two more starts hoping to break her maiden status to add value to herself as a broodmare, She is well bred (being by Belong To Me) and is a lovely big strong mare, so it appears her future is in the breeding barn.

SILKEN SAGE trialled at Orange today and finished off okay in fourth place. Experienced jockey Joe Galea rode the horse and was pleased with the trial, particularly his last 200 metres saying he will make "a real nice horse with experience." He will now go to Dubbo on Monday week.

We have three runners tomorrow - all at different venues.

CENTABEEL will kick the football when he contests race two at Bendigo with Billy Egan on board. He really has to stand up tomorrow. He has drawn ideally in barrier two and with no rain predicted for Bendigo - and they haven't had any all week - he should get a track that is no more than dead to start off with. He looks one of the three main chances in the race, the others being Mark Kavanagh's Don Columbo (Michael Rodd) and John Sadler's Module (Steven Arnold). I spoke to Troy Portelli yesterday and he reports that all is well with the horse and in fact Troy's exact words were "I can't fault him." He will be very competitive.

FLAUNTER has drawn barrier one in race two at Canberra with Tommy Berry to ride. The horse has been so honest he deserves to break his duck and Tommy gets all the options on him from the inside gate. Colbey Hill told me yesterday that the horse has thrived since his second at Wagga last Thursday and we had little option but to back him up as there was a dearth of maiden playtes available (set weights) and he would have been given 59.5kgs in any maiden - paying the price for his consistency. There is a precedent for the horse backing up as he backed up last campaign eight days apart and finished a narrow second (where else with him) at Cowra so backing up should not pose a threat. Colbey reported yesterday that the horse pleased her in his final pacework and told me "gee he pulled my arms out" and said the horse is "off his melon" which clearly indicates that he is feeling no ill effects from the Wagga trip. If he repeats the Wagga run he should win.

VAL DE LA DIVA will start at Orange for Bec Levy with James Geppert on board. She too has drawn ideally in barrier five. Bec tells me the mare has thrived since her first up run at Bathurst in an unsuitable 1100 metres race and told me yesterday "that I could not have her any better, she is eating up, looks well and is working a treat." Bruce Cross' mare Dawnfire Dancer (Josh Adams) and Warwick Hailles' horse Magic Avon (Greg Ryan) look the two main stumbling blocks in the race. If there is average speed in the race she should be getting home hard and is not out of the race at big odds.

I am hopeful that we can have a couple of winners among them.

Poor bloody FLAUNTER, he was as honest as usual at Wagga on Thursday and recorded his fourth second from his last five starts when he was knocked off by the plunge horse from the Danny Williams stable How Much My Love. I told Hugh Bowman before the race that he was honest and would do his best - and after the race Hughie said to me "you tagged him right - he ran a terrific race and tried his heart out."

Hughie added: "we got beat today by a horse that is going to win better races." Typical of our luck lately! Danny Williams has a big opinion of the winner and it had the soft run third on the fence behind us and even though it beat us 1.5 lengths - we beat the rest by two.

Forget BIG RED CAT went around. I had discussed the race with David (Payne) on the phone before Jeff Penza came out and I instructed Jeff to go forward, if they were going to give him a soft lead to take it but to have him handy. Jeff could have led, opted to ease, the horse fired up off a slow pace and was trapped "parked between" horses for most of the race racing fiercely. The first error, not going forward, created the aftermath and it was very disappointng.

TODAY WE HAVE KAIWAKA going around for the first time at Wodonga in the feature two year old race. They tell me the horse is showing some signs of ability so from today's race we should be able to get a guide on him. I am hopeful far more than confident.