Martin Dixon of the Horse Watchers gives his views on the team's chances ahead of a busy weekend for the ownership group.
This is likely to be Goldsmith's last start for us. Alice [Haynes, trainer] has done a very good job with him and he's had a good all-weather season, sneaking into the top 20 for the ARC all-weather bonus money. The ground might be a bit softer at Wetherby than he'd ideally like but the race has been the plan since the all-weather season finished.
He's a horse that works really well and needs a strong pace to aim at, but if he gets a good gallop and handles conditions he's not handicapped out of things.
He ran another excellent race behind a very progressive rival at Kempton on his most recent start. Six furlongs on the all-weather is his optimum, particularly around a bend. This is a good-value handicap and bound to be competitive but you can always count on Intervention to run his usual honest race.
He's had a hugely successful winter, winning more than £100,000 in prize-money with the ARC bonuses included. He's an example of what we're trying to do in terms of finding opportunities for horses to win as much prize-money as they are capable of doing.
He's been so tough and consistent right the way through the last six months, and it's hard to believe that a horse who started off the all-weather season rated in the '70s and having gone a long time without a win has got to the point of winning multiple races and proving better than ever. But he's really thrived on a busy schedule, he seems to love racing. He's the winningmost horse in the Horse Watchers' colours.
At Chelmsford last time the race went wrong through the first two furlongs. We popped out forward wanting a lead but nothing wanted to go on, and nothing came across him, so he saw loads of daylight and took off and pulled far too hard. And Dan Muscutt, his jockey, had to just roll with him. Zozimus ended up using far too much petrol and the whole race just went wrong for him.
He's been a frustrating horse but he does have quite a lot of ability and he's coming down to a point in the handicap that when he does everything in the right manner he is more than well enough handicapped to win soon.
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