Coral Racing Ambassador, Hugo Palmer, provides an exclusive preview of his runners at Newcastle tomorrow, including two in the feature race of the day – the Northumberland Plate.

12:55 Newcastle – Brad The Brief

We’ve been favourite all along for this, but at the time of writing I can see we’ve just been knocked off our perch.

Despite the fact he didn’t run that many times last year, he was on the go the whole season. It’s not easy when you prepare a horse for a race and have to pull them out because conditions aren’t right, which we had to do on a few occasions last year.

He came back from the stud over Christmas looking absolutely great, then in January he managed to catch one of his teeth on his rug and managed to somehow injure his jaw. He carried on eating and seemed ok, but he developed a thick winter coat and lost a bit of weight, so we just took our time we him and haven’t rushed him back at all.

He goes very well fresh, so I don’t have any reservations about him running here on his seasonal reappearance. He’s top-rated in the race by quite some way and Daz who rides him at home said he’s never felt better, so everything seems to be right for him. I’m really looking forward to getting him back on the track.

14:05 Newcastle – Rajinsky

He’s fared the better of our pair when it comes to draw as he’s got quite a nice bit of luck in stall four, which should suit him as he likes to go forward. We were going to run him at Ascot, but he’s a horse who needs cut in the ground, and we just felt conditions would be too quick for him there.

We went to Nottingham at the start of the year thinking he’d really need the race, but much to our surprise he was able to win despite looking a bit big and still having his winter coat on. We’re really happy with him now, and although he has to carry top-weight, Connor Planas takes off a very useful 5lb.

It’s a shame Harry Davies can’t continue the partnership as they seem to get on really well, but Connor is a very talented lad and he could hardly be in better form, so hopefully he can continue in that form on Saturday.

14:05 Newcastle – Zoffee

He ran really well at Ascot and he’s come out of the race really well, the only nagging doubt in the back of my mind is the 11-day turnaround. It was always the plan to go to Ascot, and we thought we’d see how he was afterwards with regards to this, but he’s come out of that race so well that we thought we had to take our chance.

Charlotte who rides him every day at home actually said to me he’s never felt so good, so maybe that Ascot race has put him spot on.

He’s drawn wide, but we’ve had horses run well in this before from wide draws, so hopefully it shouldn’t be too much of a disadvantage and it’s exciting to be going there with two live chances.

Hugo Palmer, Coral Racing Ambassador

  14:05 NORTHUMBERLAND PLATE – LATEST BETTING HERE