MONEY-SPINNING mare Boppys Princess (4.30) makes plenty of appeal in Newcastle's top-of-the-bill £10,000 Prince's Trust Handicap.

The story of Boppys Princess so far is a good old-fashioned rags to riches tale, just the sort would-be racehorse owners dream about even though there really wasn't much to enthuse over when last season she plunged to a rock-bottom selling platers' mark of 38.

It was at this point that trainer Richard Fahey somehow found the key to Boppys Princess, who after opening her account at odds of 40-1 at Beverley in July 2004, then went on to win another four races in that year.

They say nothing breeds success like success, and Boppys Princess has continued to defy a sharp rise in the ratings this season with a further brace of victories at Beverley and Leicester on her latest couple of starts.

Now standing on a lifetime career-high handicap mark of 75, the selection still appears capable of further progression and in her current rich vein of form has the potential to defy top-weight in the mile-and-a-quarter contest.

Some seriously large bets went astray both at York and Ripon when on each occasion Desert Realm (2.30) was clearly strongly fancied to get off the mark.

Mark Johnston's colt has a massive home reputation on account of his lightning fast work on the gallops, and it would be a major shock if Desert Realm fails to oblige at the third time of asking in the opening Renault Kangoo Maiden Stakes at the Tyneside track.

I'm full of hope that ten-to-follow pick, Let It Be (5.00), who turns out in the mile-and-a-half Apprentice Handicap, can boost the profit of the 2005 list.

Studying the videotape of Let It Be's reappearance at Musselburgh, she didn't seem to stay the mile-and-six-furlongs. And trainer Keith Reveley appears to have taken a similar line, dropping the four-year-old back a couple of furlongs to a more manageable distance.

Highlight of Beverley's evening meeting is the £25,000 Hillary Needler Trophy, a high-class two-year-old event confined to juvenile fillies.

On the book there's precious little between southern raiders Donna Blini and Empress Jain, however, despite having to find a few pounds of improvement to match that classy duo, Clare Hills (7.10) gets the each-way nod.

A bout of snotty noses briefly held up Karl Burke's string during the spring, thankfully though the bug has now gone away, a point underlined by Clare Hills at Carlisle last week where she won in convincing fashion.

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