Equinties - breeders grin for Charyn

Gm Equinauts

Our Risk On section has been fairly quiet since our demolition job Saturday and that won’t have appealed to a lot of readers who might have a tendency to over-bet in the week but our advice has always been the same - bet less but with conviction.

Some people simply don’t like money, which is fine, but we do and we’ll stick with our process.

We might be picking the tools back up today - Newbury is on!

Let’s dive in.

HEADLINE ROUNDUP

IT’S IN THE NAME

Many years ago, David Pipe’s dad, Martin Pipe, trained a very good horse called JURANCON II. A top staying chaser, he was the easy of winner of Haydock’s Grade 3 Gold Cup Chase in 2004, but sadly was never the same again after he crashed out of the Grand National that same year under the champ, AP McCoy.

Now, twenty years later in 2024, in the same way the tradition of training race horses was handed down by father to son, the Pipe’s have decided to bring back the name JURANCON which was clearly kept for a good one.

It’s been a while since the experienced trainer had a proper Graded novice hurdler – the last few in recent memory would be ADAGIO, a Grade 1-winning juvenile hurdler, and, funnily enough, RAMSES DE TEILLEE who won the Grade 2 Prestige Novices’ Hurdle 2020 (four years later, he was winning veterans' chases!).

But David Pipe looks to have a future star with JURANCON after his success in division two of the two-mile novices’ hurdle at Chepstow yesterday.

The market told you all you needed to know pre-race as TRIPOLI FLYER drifted slightly and the money came for Brocade Racing’s five-year-old.

The second is a well-thought-of horse in Fergal O’Brien’s yard and won a Grade 2 bumper at Aintree last year, so the bare form looks decent, and the third was a good 43 lengths behind the final pair.

So, where next for JURANCON?

Nothing is set in stone, but the obvious next targets would be the Grade 2 Winter Novices’ Hurdle at Sandown or the Grade 1 Challow Novices’ Hurdle at Newbury. Either way, a step up in trip is likely, though it seems like Newbury could be better suited to his slight left-handed jumping.

As for a piece of form to watch, can you guess the horse that beat him in a Newbury bumper in January?

That horse was Ben Pauling’s ROYSSE, and he makes his hurdles debut in the 13.05 at Newbury today. We’re going and will take keen interest in this horse today! Sometimes we’re wary of backing something too obvious - they tend to always hurt when you don’t expect them to, but we are probably going to play this lad should there be no money for the JJ horse who owns equally as good bumper form. ROYSSE’s form line through JURANCON, who looked very good yesterday, is there for all to see and Ben Pauling is the man to follow this season. A lazy favourite bet could be the one at 11/10.

THE MARKET SPOKE

Racing X turned into a steward's room yesterday. Weird that!

That’s because Harry Skelton gave LET IT RAIN a quiet ride in the maiden hurdle at Chepstow yesterday as she finished second to FRENCH SHIP, a nice horse for Phillip Hobbs and Johnson White.

Look, if she was that ready on her first run, she would have gone past the winner at the last no matter what ride Skelton gave her. Did he stop her? Well, he certainly didn’t ask her for maximum effort, but the betting market told you this in the morning.

She drifted out to nearly 2/1, so if you were still punting her at the prices, you knew what you were getting into.

She’s certainly a horse to watch going forward. Dan Skelton won’t want to make her give 110% on her first run of the season in a weak maiden hurdle. He’d rather save her to give her a good chance at winning something like the Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle at the Festival.

THE CHARYN UPDATE

Well, it’s all a bit rosy in CHARYN land right now. The star European miler of this season has landed in Japan ahead of his final career run, and his stallion fee at Sumbe’s Haras de Montfort et Preaux has been announced for grinning prospective breeders.

Roger Varian floated up the idea of running his four-year-old by DARK ANGEL in the Mile Championship on Luck On Sunday after British Champions Day, but to turn him around in just over two weeks to ship him over to Asia is a great achievement.

And it could well be very worth the trip - the winner gets £1,000,000, while the second gets £400,000 and the third pockets a generous £250,000!

As for his stallion fee, he has been given a price tag of €35,000, but there will probably be a sense of caution surrounding him in the breeding ranks.

Obviously, DARK ANGEL and KODIAC as sire and damsire respectively are positives, but he didn’t win his first Group 1 until he was four. He was sharp enough as a juvenile as he landed the Group 2 Criterium de Maisons-Laffitte, but he probably won’t be one for breeders who are looking for precocious two-year-olds.

He was as sound as anything though during his racing career, and that will give him a bit of support.

RISK ON

No obvious bets as of yet but we do have a shortlist for both Ludlow and our home ground Newbury.

Any bets will be posted on X - @equinties.

WANT TO SEE US AT OUR BEST? SIGN UP TO THE WEEKENDER BELOW!

Become a paying subscriber of Premium to get access to this post and other subscriber-only content.

Already a paying subscriber? Sign In.

A subscription gets you:

• • The weekender edition (Mon-Fri still free)
• • The weekends best bets
• • That warm fuzzy feeling inside knowing the intern gets fed
• • Only £1 a week!