THE first day of the Sky Bet Ebor Festival was replete with strongly-run races producing slow finishes. Only Small Fry in the two-mile Sky Bet Stayers Handicap was able to better the Par Finishing Speed Percentage (FSP).

It is hard to quantify what caused these relatively slow finishes other than to suggest that jockeys, who for the last month have been negotiating fast ground, struggled to adjust to the slower conditions that prevailed last week.