Kempton Preview: Stick with Solidarity to complete hat-trick

Solidarity is on a serious upwarad curve and looks capable of defying a career-high mark to land the hat-trick in the 1m 3f feature handicap on today’s twilight card at Kempton (6.20).

The Charlie Appleby trained gelding looked a handicapper to keep onside when bolting up by 3 1/2 lengths at Wolverhamptonon his penultimate start off a mark of 88 and confirmed that impression when following up in impressive fashion over course and distance off 6lb higher last time out.

The three-year-old was held-up at the rear in the latter before making smooth headway two from home and quickening nicely inside the last to beat Double Discount by a length.

Solidarity was value for much more than the winning margin, and it was a very taking performance given the positional bias he had to overcome.

Although the son of Dubawi has been raised a further 6lb for that success to 100, he looks the type who has even more to offer and could potentially be a pattern performer in the making on synthetic surfaces.

Another plus is that Soldiarity’s handler has a 25% strike rate with his runners at the venue in the past 12 months, and Adam Kirby is a positive jockey booking as he has been successful on 31% of the runners he has ridden for the yard in the same period for a huge profit of £35.65 to a £1 level stake.

Trainer Mick Appleby has his team in tremendous form and Dame Lucy can provide him with another winner in the 2m handicap that closes proceedings (6.50).
The filly bolted up on her first start for the Newark-based handler when landing a 1m 2f class 4 contest on soft ground at Nottingham off a mark of 75 and backed that up with a solid second in a similar grade contest at Newbury off 80.

Dame Lucy then disappointed at Newmarket before bouncing back to finish a good third in a class 3 contest on the Tapeta surface at Wolverhampton nine days ago after being stepped up significantly in trip to 2m 1f.

The three-year-old gets into this lower grade class 4 contest off the same mark of 82, and that looks exploitable given her unexposed profile as a stayer.
The booking of Adam Kirby to do the steering also catches the eye, and daughter of Refuse To Bend looks the one to beat if taking to the polytrack surface at the first attempt.