Equinties - brighterdays for punters

Gm Equinauts

It’s only a day and a week until the Cheltenham Festival, so please make sure you’re signed up to our premium newsletter to access all our Cheltenham Festival content - there will be a newsletter every day of Cheltenham for you to read, digest and ponder ahead of each days racing.

Let’s dive in.

HEADINE ROUND UP

BRIGHTERDAYS FOR THE CHAMPION HURDLE

We all knew connections wouldn’t resist the temptation to run BRIGHTERDAYSHEAD in the Champion Hurdle. Gordon Elliott hasn’t hidden the fact he thinks this is his best chance to win hurdlings flagship event.

Enamoured by her recent victory and clearly not put off by Sevenbarrows’ away day at Kempton, Elliott and the O’Leary’s are rolling the dice and taking on CONSTITUTION HILL. Fair f*cking play.

No one wants to see what would effectively be a walk over for ‘Le Freak’, CONSTITUTION HILL, so the addition of Gordon’s wonder-mare is brilliant for racing…

but could this already epic line up be boosted further by the presence of LOSSIEMOUTH too?

Wizard the Willie now has a big decision to make - go and win the Mares or give the people what they want; LOSSIEMOUTH versus BRIGHTERDAYSAHEAD and LE FREAK.

Despite Willie’s comments that she’s been trained all year for the Champion Hurdle we do suspect connections will want to maintain her unbeaten Festival record.

Exciting times for punters and we absolutely know who we are with. We have a strong view on this race.

A GRAND DAWNING

Dan Skelton is a great trainer, more he’s arguably the best trainer in the UK now. He’s switched on, he’s a long term planner whilst equally not afraid to run his horses, and he knows how to handle good ones.

GREY DAWNING is a perfect example. He probably made a mistake in the first half of the season with him. Either he should have avoided the Betfair Chase altogether, or he shouldn’t have run him in King George after the Betfair Chase. With the way the calendar is for staying chasers in that first part of the season, it is easy to overrun horses by readying them for a Betfair Chase and King George. Skelton’s former boss, Paul Nicholls, did this with BRAVEMANSGAME in 2023, and he hasn’t been at his best ever since:

So, even though GREY DAWNING didn’t have the best start to his season, Skelton adapted to what was happening to get the best out of him. What we mean by this is not targeting him at the Cheltenham Festival. Another big run, this time in the Gold Cup, would be the only thing he could do in the second-half of the season due to the close proximity between

Cheltenham and Aintree this season. So, a run in the Premier Chase and the Aintree Bowl makes the most sense, and the first leg of the plan was a successful one on Saturday.

We can’t be too negative about this. He drifted in the morning before being sent off 5/6 at the off, and we highlighted in our Saturday newsletter that Skelton tends to leave bits to work on with these top horses in their prep runs. So, beating a race-fit IROKO while giving 3lbs away on good to soft ground looks like a fine effort. He could well turn up to the Aintree Bowl against a very beatable field and land his first Grade 1 since the Turners. It’s not hard to envision this occurring.

On the effort, Skelton said: "He's one of our flagship horses. He was a good second at Haydock but second is second and we want a winner. To have gone and done that today and be so impressive was brilliant. "We wanted to see him back to what we know he can do and that was superb today; he jumped beautifully.” Roll on Aintree.

More: https://www.racingpost.com/news/reports/grey-dawning-back-to-his-best-with-impressive-premier-chase-success-aYExY0j16PLF/

RACE TO FOLLOW

In these weeks leading up to the Cheltenham Festival, weekend racing can drop down a peg or two. That’s fair enough, it’s always going to happen, but sometimes, there are pieces of form that end up working out well.

It’s tough to predict which races will work out well without seeing the horses reappear, but we’re going to make a prediction and suggest that the 15:05 at Newbury on Saturday - a 2m handicap hurdle - could be a race to follow.

JURANCON won the race, and even though he is rated just 127, he was a big hype horse at the start of the season. That’s because he finished second to ROYSSE and THE KEMBLE BREWERY before his smart success over TRIPOLI FLYER. TRIPOLI FLYER went on to win the Grade 2 Docecote Novices’ Hurdle, so that form got a nice boost.

He was then beaten at Exeter before returning to the winners’ enclosure at Newbury in January, and then he won on his handicap debut on Saturday. He is ultimately a really smart horse who has scope to improve off his mark, and the horses he had in behind are also fairly sharp. LARIO, the runner-up, finished behind SECRET SQUIRREL and HELNWEIN in April 2024 and the third, SORCELEUR, is an improving five-year-old for Paul Nicholls. These two horses will be winning soon, and if that is the case, David Pipe is set to have some nice fun with JURANCON going forward. Where? Well, it could start with a trip to Liverpool, as Pipe said: “The further he went the better and his formlines are strong. He’s got a great attitude, which is half the battle, and we might have a look at Aintree with him." Eyes firmly on how this race develops going forward.

WEEKEND EYE-CACTHERS

QUEENSBURY BOY – SATURDAY 13:30 DONCASTER

We’re highlighting a winner here, but we really just want to highlight David Maxwell!

We love that mean and he could have a nice horse on his hands with QUEENSBURY BOY. Harry Derham was very complimentary of him at Chepstow when he won a bumper in December 2023, and his PtP form ahead of QUEBECOIS and MAGICAL KING looks nice. 

Speaking of good form, it’s hard to get away from his second to WINGMEN at the Punchestown Festival. THE PASSING WIFE, the third, has won two bumpers since as well to further frank the form. He’s had plenty of time away from the track as this was his seasonal reappearance, but he bolted up on Saturday and could be won for Aintree or even Punchestown again. Nice horse.

GO ON, MAD MAXWELL!

ALNILAM - SATURDAY 15.30 KELSO

ALNILAM is a good, honest horse for Olly Murphy who is likely to win a fair few races going forward. He finished second in the Morebattle on Saturday when trying to make all, and CRACKING RHAPSODY had to work really hard to feel him in. He was a decent operator on the Flat and he’s run some nice races over hurdles so far, notably when beating BALHAMBAR at Southwell. He’s a nice horse who will continue to do damage as he goes through the ranks, especially if he drops a few pounds in the future.

RISK ON

If we decide to bet today we will post it on our X account @equinties. We won’t be shy to bet after a bad week of near misses last week but with Cheltenham around the corner, but we need to be hyper-clinical.

Our Cheltenham giveaway slip is close to hitting the like count, so we will extend the comp until the end of today because we really want our readers to get excited for next week with a nice slip in their possession. We will announce the lucky winner in tomorrows newsletter.

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