Harrison gets to grips with Magic's antics
Orlando Magic looked in great shape yesterday morning as he sped through his paces for the in-form duo of trainer Geoff Lane and jockey David Harrison.
He's a good worker at the best of times and the problem is usually to make him run slower rather than faster in the mornings, to try to get him to relax.
To this end Lane has used the clerk of the course and his pony to take him out on to the grass track when he works to try to calm him.
Yesterday Orlando Magic worked on the main all-weather track and he does seem to have taken to Harrison and managed to run even sectionals of 23.2 seconds for the hard-working and talented Welshman.
Orlando Magic looked very well in himself and appears to have trained on well since his battling first-up third to Victory And Gold and Forest Spring and this could be his season, when he's at his peak.
As for his weight, the Jockey Club have acknowledged that the 1,150 pounds they posted for him prior to his reappearance was indeed incorrect.
There have been a few of these mistakes creeping through and it is usually on the upside and is thought to result from those in charge of the weighing failing to ensure the horses are properly standing still.
If they are jig-jogging during the weighing they are putting extra pressure on the scales and thus the mistakes are made.
As far as Orlando Magic is concerned it is best to assume he was the same weight as towards the end of last season, say some 100 pounds lighter than the flawed 1,150-pound figure.
The Peter Ng Bik-kuen camp were busy yesterday morning with his Musical Insight going particularly well under his riding boy.
The Irish import should lack little in fitness when seen out as he's been doing plenty and yesterday's solid 1,200-metre piece in one minute and 23.5 seconds comes off the back of a good trial on Tuesday morning down the straight 1,000-metre chute.
It could well be that Ng is getting Musical Insight ready for a first-up go.
Ng's potentially useful stayer, Charity First, looks to be coming to hand, too. He needed his debut run over an inadequate 1,400 metres but looks to have blossomed since that outing.
Yesterday he was partnered through a fluent 800 metres by one of his regular riders, the currently suspended Danny Lee.
They breezed through 800 metres in a very comfortable 51.4 with Charity First looking to be in the pink.
Ng, who had a quiet season last term but could be sending out a few more winners this time round, also has the enigmatic Win It All working pleasingly.
Win It All has always been able to gallop in the mornings, a bit like Orlando Magic, but his trouble has been getting out of the barriers.
He may still be a touch on the big side at the moment and may take one more race to trim down but he has just started to work with that bounce and zest that characterised his best pieces of last season.
The Lawrie Fownes' team were also in the thick of things with the Class One first-season import, Easy Star, already showing enough to suggest he has been an astute purchase.
He was not asked for a serious effort as he swung through 1,200 metres under Wendyll Woods in 1:24.0 but he moved and looked as if he deserved his 93 rating in the top grade. He'd also impressed on Tuesday morning.
