Nice recovery day on day 3 for me. 6 winners for the day, 4 winners at Dubai. My sprinters an middle distance horses look the ones to carry me through the season so far. My milers probably gonna struggle. Likely to find the depth of my squad not quite strong enough to challenge Josh, but I should pick up plenty of top winners with the best of my team hopefully

The way Silly Little Style won was very impressive at Dubai over 5f. He's technically only my 3rd best 5f horse in the league, but seemed to prefer Dubai more. The other 2, Sluggish Tigress (also over6f) an Velocity World both winning in week 1 too is a very good sign.

Sensational Knight winning the Duty Free well, despite running wide was a big bonus. He'll improve so much for the extra furlong too. Could be a big player this season as he can do it on any kind of track. Still think the Winter Derby 2nd - Sordid Sensation will prove to be better mind you

Velocity Sensation over 6f may prove to be pretty decent too. Very good performance in the Golden Shaheen. Looking forward to seeing this one throughout the season, though he could end up like a John Morgan horse, an only be targeted at specific races as plenty of options over 6f in the team

Thank you Jim, you are too kind.

Plenty of room for improvement on the comms, but I think Day 2 was better than Day 1 and Day 3 was better than Day 2. The hardest part I found was reading out all the horses and trainer's names at the start.

Now I know to most of you I will sound Aussie, but I am actually English - 36 years in a penal colony will do that to your voice! (apologies to Ash Munas the only true blue Aussie in the league).

And a big shout out to Martin who helped me through some teething and technical difficulties over the weekend.

Decent start with a winner in week one & 4 places

thanks to everyone running the show

big shout out to all the commentators brilliant stuff very much appreciated

Surprisingly good first week, but one swallow doesn't make a summer and they were all maiden races so I'm not going to get ahead of myself. However I have already beaten my total number of winners for the whole of last season with my NH stable.

On the flat my stayers looked good as I hoped they would, maybe going to have a good battle with Josh in the St Leger. Most of the Dubai races were a little disappointing but managed a couple of places.

Over the jumps my chasers completely surprised me - I didn't think they would be that good. Also their front running surprised me a bit! Emerging is the only one who usually leads so I feared the worst when others went to the front early on. My hurdlers were solid, looking quite good for the staying hurdle races.

It's true I put a lot of work in between last season and this, but I couldn't have done it without the help and advice of every single one of you. So a big thanks.

sorry stu on my late runners didnt know what time of races was
so was in a big rush to get them ready

great races watched this week
thanx to all staff
great comms Paul
as to with martin
and the sarky stu

Great start for me with 7 winners in the NH

2 of them, G2 wins at Galway, with Speed Team winning the Hurdle and Always Brave winning the Chase
Nice, surprising G3 win too by Flying Up winning the 2m3 chase in America, I think she is better over 2m4/5

No winners on flat, but not surprised all likely handicappers, but maybe Whiteoak, Tuberose, and The Hero

Great to have the league up and running again, thanks to everyone helping run the league

Less said about my donkeys the better. Roll on the handicaps! Thanks to everyone who runs the game.

Note to Martin. Ted Dibiase is ex wwe wrestler from the 80s known as the Million Dollar man. Suspect I might have even stumped Stu with that one.

And since we’re making notes to Martin, totally agree with the handicapping assessment, but is an interesting situation for the league. But it’s accurate and certainly for my chasers fair, they are still largely the same horses they were last season due to the way I export them. But it will also make the handicaps approachable straight away for the lower tier of trainers, something that usually takes a few weeks. It may also encourage bringing horses back, since your punished by doing so, says the guy with a 170+ returner for the National

Only potential downsides, more chance of handicaps being blown up by a cluster of very high rated horses and smaller handicap fields whilst likely largwr for the graded ones.

It's like playing golf, play horrible all day but sneak a par or birdie on the last to get you back next time.

My 2 years are holding up the stable atm. Hopefully some of the others just had an off day.

Paul - you sound English to me haha and I listen to a lot of Yorkshire podcasts (leeds Utd). Perth, you are either a miner or English

Started a bit rough Tuesday and Wednesday with no winners but enough money earners to keep spirits up knowing that 1st week winners doesn't always mean a great season ahead (I've been burnt before).
Thursdays big races were the tonic I needed. Greek Tribute was not the one I expected though (running over hurdles week 2), I would have tipped Fantasia so that was a surprise. Also I thought On The Darkside was maybe over the hill but was chucked in to make up numbers over hurdles.
Eye catching runner for me was Instructor in the Galway Hurdle dropped out but made ground when it mattered then hit a wall of horses with nowhere to go but pulled out late and closing at the finish. Surprised to be rated only 138.
All said and done I wouldn't run them in the Graded races week 1 if I thought they were handicappers.
Thanks to all volunteers.

First of all my horses:

Pretty rubbish as expected as have had no playing time despite the length between seasons.

My returners on NH should be about the same level as before. New ones likewise. I'll be too high for the low stuff and not good enough for the high stuff. Am sure I will pick up a few big wins though but that halcyon year of a 4th place finish in the NH is not going to be repeated.

Flat is more interesting as I started a new line from a game stallion that produced a decent colt who ran well and the few runners from him did likewise. So maybe I will get some success on flat next season if things pan out ok. This year will be a struggle and a return to the top 10 is unlikely.

Handicap wise I chose to make the comments about the ratings to show that horses can perform for more than one season. There are far more top trainers bringing horses back which is great so hats off to those that are doing it. Maybe we should find a way to encourage it.

But I also did it to show that handicap ratings are just too high and that I think is mostly down to over reaction to maiden wins. All this a maiden is akin to a Group 1 is nonsense and it is good to see Vinny moving away from that. I would rather see a horse be a handicap blip in week 2 and get an easy win than a bunch of horses get over rated and be done for the season because of their run in week one. Whack the two time winners up but don't crucify the ones that just do well in week one.

Maybe returning horses should be given a statutory drop at start of the season. Maybe 14 on NH and 7 or 10 on flat. Then they could just easily be put back up if they won in week 1. Also might encourage more to bring horses back.

Comms wise:

It's great to have Stu in from the start this season and he should be given far more credit as he race runs as well and is also one of the original players from the old days. Maybe I should stop calling him THE HOUSEWIVES FAVOURITE and rename him THE GRAND OLD MAN OF STARTERS ORDERS

Paul made a great start and hopefully will stick around for the long haul as he seems a natural just like Stu was when he came into the comms team all those years ago. Really enjoying having more flat races to just watch and enjoy as last season I was doing the lot until Jim came in to help later in the season. Paul's enthusiasm has given me a bit of a lift too and a comms team vibe is beginning to return.

It would be great if any of Nick, Jim and Gray could make yourselves available for cover if anyone is unable to do it for the odd week as all 3 of you were great when you did it in the past.

Stu and I are still badgering Doug about coming back on our whatsapp chat ( although it is mostly used for taking the mickey out of Stu and Man Utd) and we remain hopeful we can coerce him back in when SO8 starts.

Finally we still need more people to help out as Alex has a lot on his plate, Stu is doing two jobs and the handicapping must be a nightmare especially when you get eejits like me pointing out ratings after races so if you can do anything to help please do.

It is a unique little community we have here and we should do all we can to preserve it and it would be really good if we could build it back to what it was in those heady SO6 days.

We can all play our part in doing that, however small it may be.

Your Starters Orders Online League needs YOU !!!!

I agree, I think a drop of 14 pounds over jumps and 10 pounds on the flat would be a good way of bringing horses back. I might even go as far and say 14 pounds on each and that way if u don't have chance to bred between seasons then u'll still have a chance next.

Let's say a jumper who finished with a rating of 165 one season would open up with a rating of 151 next, that's probably around the same rating a good winner of maiden would get.

Whoevers in charge make it happen.

Regarding the Handicapping, I also find that making sure there's a big drop in ratings if there's a 1L distance between places in these maidens. The flat races I've done, I've adjusted the '1lb to 1/4L' rule an made the drops in ratings bigger as you go down the field. Once we get back to Handicap races I'll go back to the usual routine. Hoping it gives everyone a fairer starting point which is where most the issues have been I think

If there's any other admin I can help with, let me know. I don't mind getting involved a bit more. I only have the free dropbox though, not sure if that will allow me to run a few races if needed (NH preference)? Or other stuff in the background.

Just looked through the racecards for the flat, in between RR the NH.

No one likes a heavy track haha, lots of excuses!!