It's that time of year again, when thoughts turn from the past in search of glories in the future, and we start preparations for the Festive Season - not Christmas but the Cheltenham Festival!
I say this every year, and there is no harm in repeating it, in the 51-days between Christmas Day and Valentines Day (14th February), 95% of all the winners at Cheltenham in mid-March will run their final preparatory race, and 55% of those winners will win that race.
If at no other time of year you buy it, starting on Wednesday 2nd January 2019 you should buy the Racing Post Weekender every week for the results pull-out and start preparing for the best 4-days of sport this country has to offer. !
Before Christmas, we have some great racing at Ascot tomorrow and Saturday, Uttoxeter tomorrow, together with Haydock and Newcastle on Saturday. There is no racing on Sunday or Monday, and we can take time to study the form for the Welsh National to be run at Chepstow on Thursday 27th December.
For Friday's meeting at Ascot, pay attention to the form of the opening maiden hurdle race run over 2m5f as this has been won by some decent horses in recent years, and I will be interested in how the Nicky Henderson trained pair of Gallahers Cross and Igor run. The remainder of the Ascot card does not look like offering any value wagers, and the racing at Uttoxeter is not up to much.
Onto Saturday, and what is interesting is the Nicky Henderson - fresh from successfully returning BRAIN POWER to hurdling - has left TOP NOTCH (his OR162 chaser) in the "Long Walk Hurdle" run over 3-miles. Although this will be much further than he's raced as a hurdler before, he's shown that this trip is within his scope as a chaser and he would look an interesting candidate if it weren't for his stablemate CALL ME LORD. He looked every inch a top-class staying hurdler when winning at Sandown on the final day of the jumps season in April, with Lil Rockerfella and Wholestone toiling in his wake. Sam Spinner who won this race last year, will have to return to that form if he's to succeed again, and Agrapart will be hoping for the ground to turn heavy to give him a chance.
The feature race at Ascot on Saturday, the Garrard Silver Cup, looks being a cracker. Last years winner GOLD PRESENT looks well-up to repeating that win based on his effort LTO over 2m5f here at Ascot behind the top-class pair of Politologue and Charbel. The only horse I can see giving him a race is the 6yo Thomas Patrick who started the joint-fav for the Ladbrokes Trophy at Newbury, but too much use of him was made early-on in that race and he was a spent force a mile out. Another possible interesting entry is Minella Daddy as he's won over C&D before, and wasn't beaten far into 2nd in this race as a 6yo off OR142 in 2016. He's not been very consistent since then and runs off OR136 on Saturday, but given his form on this track, and other right-handed courses, he could be worth an each-way wager.
Haydock stages the "Tommy Whittle" Chase over 2m7f, and this handicap chase is a favourite of mine, in fact I really enjoy these 3-mile handicap chases at Haydock as a betting medium. My early thoughts are that this race looks wide open, and I'm going to spend a bit of time tomorrow looking for the winner which I expect to be outside the current front-3 in the betting.
The other race that I'm going to look at in some depth tomorrow is the Welsh National run at Chepstow next Thursday, as I've had some great wagers in this race over the years.
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of sport
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