That’s it for another year for jumps racing fans. Now the preparation begins for the next Festival.
Without a doubt, LONG RUN was a fantastic winner for the sport and crowned a magnificent week of racing. With 2 jumps to go, I really thought Denman was going to go on and win the Gold Cup, but it was not to be. Even so, it was a great effort from the old campaigner who has now come 2nd in this race 3 times.
He helped the blog end with a 3pt profit from the antepost list of selections (see adjacent antepost advices page).
It is very hard at the moment to see a horse emerge to challenge Long Run for the Gold Cup next season when he’ll be only 7yo, but you never know. None of the “big 3” will be capable of winning the race next year, and what this Festival showed was that horses cannot be “saved” for Cheltenham.
I’ll be writing a Festival analysis over the next week or so, and will go into the races in more depth.
Visits to the blog site have been tremendous this week, over 500 visits on several days. Saturdays nearly always shows a dip in visitor numbers to the blog, probably because most people visit the blog while at work but on Saturdays (especially, when it’s good weather like today) they have other demands on their time (shopping, washing the car, gardening etc).
There are 3 jump meetings today, at Uttoxeter, Newcastle and Ffos Las.
Uttoxeter has the feature race of the day, the Midlands National at 3:00 over 4-mile 1-furlong & 110 yards – a true marathon. It is being run on soft going, which should ensure more than a few finishers. After previous blog selection Holmwood Legend won in the week at 25/1, it may prove to stick with another previous blog selection for this race LE BEAU BAI. He ran a good race for me LTO when 3rd at Haydock to Silver By Nature on heavy going. He pulled-up in this race last year, but that was on very heavy going when only 3 finished the race, and he carried 11st 3lb too. Given that prior to Synchronised last year, there had been no winner in recent times carrying more than 10st 9lb, his task then was a bit steep. He has just 10st 2lb today, with regular rider Jake Greenall’s 7lb allowance dropping that to 9st 9lb, he looks to be very interesting to me. Currently 12/1 (from 14’s) he may be worth an in-running play. He drops out early in his races, and then stays on strong in the final mile or so. LTO, I was able to get 10’s on Betfair in-running on the place-only market (to small money) when it looked like he was about to pull-up with about ¾ of a mile to go. There are a lot of solid stayers in this race tho’, so I’ll not make him a solid selection but I would not put any readers off having a wager on him. For instance, Tricky Trickster last won when Ruby Walsh was riding him, he races off a 3lb lower mark than then today and, remarkably, went off at 12/1 for the Gold Cup in 2010 on the back of that win. Gentle Ranger is reported to be in good form by handicap king David Pipe, and Halcon Generlardais was running in Grade 1 chases just 15 months ago, and running well. Off OR128 today with just 10st to carry he could be thrown-in.
Thanks for reading this blog to all new visitors.
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Thanks from Wayward Lad
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