Equinties - Festival swings

Gm Equinauts

There are only a few special days in the year when you can excitedly tell people who probably don’t care that the Cheltenham Festival IS NEXT WEEK.

Whether it’s telling your boss to f*ck off (give me my holiday) or simply sending a bomb of a message to your ‘punting’ whatsapp group to get your mates gee’d up, saying Cheltenham is next week is one of the true simple and free pleasures of a National Hunt fan’s season.

But it’s not all singing and dancing for some racing fans, especially not if your name is John Dance. Bad pun.

News broke this weekend that the FCA are doubling down on former high profile owner, breeder and racing sponsor John Dance, famous for horses such as LAURENS and of course, BRAVEMANSGAME, after describing his case as “one of the largest frauds perpetrated by an FCA regulated individual at an authorised firm”. Ouch.

We’re sure we will be talking about this case a lot more this year.

Let’s dive in.

HEADLINE ROUNDUP

CHELTENHAM CLUES

As ever with the close proximity to the Festival, there is a lack of outrageous clues for Cheltenham that will reveal themselves. The one that should be taken note of came at Navan on Saturday as perm-filler BLOOD DESTINY bounced back to form to win on his first start at two miles over fences. 

It was a fairly weak contest, but the Willie Mullins-trained five-year-old put in a dominant performance, and plenty hope that he will now turn up to the Arkle. 

Interestingly, despite the facile nature of his win, he is still 16/1 to win the second race of the Cheltenham Festival. In what looks like an open contest, is he the each-way angle into the race?

Away from Ireland, we zero in on Sevenbarrows as every single punter carrying ante-post slips waits with bated breath for the blood tests of one CONSTITUTION HILL. 

More on this as it comes out. 

FESTIVAL FORM

Although he failed to win on Saturday as our Newsletter NAP, PERSONAL AMBITION, beat him in the Grade 2 Premier Novices’ Hurdle, JANGO BAIE’s second at Kelso does add some meat onto the bones of some Festival hopefuls. 

The first of which is a stablemate to PERSONAL AMBITION as HANDSTANDS beat JANGO BAIE in last month’s Sidney Banks Memorial Novices’ Hurdle by a length further while receiving the same five pounds in weight. 

Arguably, HANDSTANDS beat JANGO BAIE easier than PERSONAL AMBITION did, though the latter did take the first two hurdles with him on Saturday and still did well to win around a stiff track and the vibes from the Pauling camp are PERSONAL AMBITION is as good if not better than HANDSTANDS (which makes the vid below very intersting).

Ben Pauling has been doing the rounds of Cheltenham previews over the last few weeks and he has not hidden his excitement:

SCRATCHINGS

It seems like there is a lingering doubt around a few Gordon Elliott horses before the start of the Festival after yesterday as he did his final bit of work before jump racing’s Olympics.

Apparently, of the horses that worked, FIRM FOOTINGS fell when schooling (and he’s now out of the Kim Muir), and there are a few doubts about others. These “hiccups” were even spoken about by Elliott on Racing TV. 

As for other horses who won’t make Cheltenham, FERNY HOLLOW has developed a completely different injury to the one he has had over the last few seasons and he now won’t make the Champion Chase. Time for the lad to enjoy a life away from racing?

And in news related to scratchings, NASSALAM, who had been ruled out of the Cheltenham Gold Cup earlier this season, has been thrown back into the Gold Cup picture by Gary Moore IF the ground turns up soft. With the weather forecast looking fairly bright, we say he is an unlikely runner!

WEEKEND EYECATCHERS

KANDOO KID – SATURDAY 13.55 NEWBURY 

If there is one horse that has shown their love for Newbury this season (and the mud), KANDOO KID is definitely that horse. Paul Nicholls’ eight-year-old has been thrown into the limelight this season with four seconds and one win – three of these performances at Newbury – and despite being well-backed on Saturday, he ran into Dan Skelton’s HELTENHAM who looked well-handicapped and ready to win. As for KANDOO KID, Nicholls has let on that the Coral Gold Cup could be a tailormade race for him next season and he may well be onto something. Three miles, Newbury, and an early-season target could see him at his best. 

MALYSTIC – SATURDAY 14.35 DONNY

MALYSTIC has a great record around Doncaster, and he certainly showed that on Saturday, though there could be a race in mind for him at Ayr in April. Back on his last winning mark of 147, the 10-year-old ran well behind a well-handicapped RIDERS ON THE STORM and an improving HOMME PUBLIC on Saturday, so he should enter the tracker. 

He won at the Scottish Grand National meeting last year off 147 in a handicap chase (beating the subsequent Clarence House winner ELIXIR DE NUTZ), so maybe connections might save him for that race. After all, it was worth £22,780 to the winner last year but it may be worth more due to Premierisation this year.

MINELLA DRAMA – SATURDAY 15.25 KELSO

There’s an argument to suggest that MINELLA DRAMA should have won Saturday’s Listed Premier Chase at Kelso, though only if it was over two-and-a-half miles.

That’s right, Donald McCain’s nine-year-old has all of his form over the middle trip and Saturday was his first dive into three miles, and although he ran with credit, he was outstayed by THUNDER ROCK. Unlike the fast-finishing AYE RIGHT, he set off for home with a high cruising speed around the bend and didn’t seem to fully see it out. Off a mark of 154, the handicapper might drop him a few pounds this week and he could pop up in a nice handicap off top weight as he has plenty of ability.

NEWSLETTER HORSE

The team behind this newsletter checked in on the new newsletter horse over the weekend and there were some very bullish statements made about the big boy. The Intern (who nearly got sacked this weekend for leaving stuff out the newsletter again) even made him into a meme:

He will make his highly anticipated debut this year, but to learn more about his pedigree, follow his progress and find out what his new trainer has said about his work so far, simply click the bottom link and subscribe to our weekender edition to be a part of the journey.

Full update tonight feat. naming competition - if your suggestion gets the vote, you will get an Owners & Trainers badge for his first race and a free £100 wager on him

RISK ON

16.40 SAMAZUL

Pauling’s a cheat code atm. We have had a lot yield from that yard recently and we think it’s this lads turn today in a very weak race. Even money is a good bet.

19.30 HAVANAZAM

Should still be well handicapped and conditions perfect for him tonight to carry on pressing through the staying ranks. 4’s everywhere is a dirty ew play or bigger on exchange to make your own. We’ll use exchange.

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