Best Of Bets

Tag: Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup

  • Cheltenham Festival: Champion Hurdle Day handicap preview

    Cheltenham Festival: Champion Hurdle Day handicap preview

    The Cheltenham Festival. A place where dreams are made of and hopes are shattered on the floor. Seven races per day, four times over, all around the hallowed turf of Prestbury Park.

    Plenty of time is spent trying to work out the Championship races on each day, but throughout all the cards, the handicaps offer a brilliant stage for betting angles and each-way edges.

    To try and help guide you through each day of the Cheltenham Festival, Best Of Bets lists some of the key players in the handicaps on day one of horse racing’s Olympics.

    TUESDAY – Ultima Handicap Chase

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    Starting with the opening handicap race of the week, the Ultima, there are a few on my shortlist for the 3m1f contest.

    Firstly, I thought CLOUDY GLEN for Venetia Williams could outrun his odds at 20/1 with William Hill. This 10-year-old was second in the 2021 Kim Muir off a mark of 140, only five pounds below his current rating, in a race won by the very impressive Mount Ida. Two starts after that, he won the Ladbrokes Trophy Chase (old Hennessy) off the same mark in a tight finish with Fiddlerontheroof with the pair pulling 28 lengths clear of Brahma Bull in third.

    After that, he was disappointing in his next two starts before having a year-long lay-off and then he ran a great race to finish in the places at Haydock in the Grand National Trial last month. I think he can run a massive race off 145.

    However, the horse I’ll be hanging my hat on is THE GOFFER at 12/1 with William Hill for the Gordon Elliott stable.

    He’s only a six-year-old and has plenty of improvement about him. What’s interesting about him is that he won at the Dublin Racing Festival off a mark of 138 in early February, a rating that could have got him into the Kim Muir with a cracking chance even with the Irish tax applied to him by the British handicapper.

    However, connections decided to send him to the race on the last day, a contest he won, and now he’s rated 11lbs higher off a mark of 149. Now, that may be steep, but he collected victory over potentially the wrong trip and he was very good throughout. I think he is the classy horse of the race and potentially the one to beat.

    TUESDAY – Boodles Juvenile Handicap Hurdle

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    Sticking with the Irish, I am chancing Charles’ Byrnes’ BYKER in the Boodles Juvenile Handicap Hurdle

    Coming into Sunday, I was all over Common Practice for Joseph O’Brien, however, he was the only horse not to be declared for the race, so I’ve had to switch it up a bit.

    Up four pounds from his official Irish mark, the four-year-old Le Havre gelding ran a great race to finish third on his last start behind Sir Allen at Naas in Febuary when giving away seven pounds.

    Now in handicap company, he is rated three pounds below the formerly mentioned Andrew Slattery-trained runner for just a two length defeat.

    He looks to move through his races very well and at 7/1 with William Hill, he looks like the most likely winner in my eyes.

  • Cheltenham 2023: The Cheltenham 5: Galopin Des Champs

    Cheltenham 2023: The Cheltenham 5: Galopin Des Champs

    As we build up to the big off on Tuesday, there is surely no bigger draw during festival week than the Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup.

    One year off its centenary this year, previous winners stand as the very cream of the Sport of Kings.

    Arkle, L’Escargot and more recently Best Mate, Kauto Star and Denman grace the halls of glory from this epic showdown.

    This year, the contenders are lining up once more but will it be Galopin De Champs to seal Gold Cup glory in 2023?

    Cheltenham heartbreak

    Rewind to Cheltenham last year and Galopin Des Champs looked well set for a second successive festival win.

    After victory in the Martin Pipe Handicap Hurdle in 2021, Willie Mullins waited to pouch yet another Cheltenham victory.

    Indeed, for 15 of the 16 fences in the Turner Novices’ Chase, the double was in the bag.

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    But as Mullins’ 6yo climbed over the final hurdle with a 12-length lead as 5/6f, Galopin Des Champs landed awkwardly, stumbled and fell in dramatic scenes.

    Leaving the trailing Bob Olinger and Rachael Blackmore to pick up the pieces, Cheltenham was left stunned.

    For Jockey Paul Townend and all involved, it was a bitter pill of defeat to swallow.

    Yet, after woe 12 months back, the French gelding looks primed to deliver a year on.

    In fact, Galopin Des Champs looks close to one of the shoo-ins of the festival.

    Mullins’ magic touch

    From his first outing, Galopin Des Champs looked bound for greatness.

    Mullins knew it also, catching his eye on home debut at Auteuil just six months into his career.

    Prepped with hopes for later in the season, Galopin was given runs at Gowran Park, Limerick and Leopardstown.

    It was in the latter race at a price of 100/1, he came a hugely creditable sixth. The penny dropped.

    Going off at 8/1 in his Cheltenham bow, Sean O Keeffe picked a steady trip and held off the similarly priced Langer Dan to take the winning post.

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    As Mullins’ number one jockey, Townend then took the reins for the trip back to Ireland for the Irish Novice Hurdle.

    The 11-length victory margin was emphatic.

    When Galopin Des Champs then began the 2021 season with a Leopardstown double, the Turners’ seemed to be academic.

    But destiny dealt a cruel blow from the jaws of victory.

    Galopin Des Champs courting destiny?

    But could fate bite back this year?

    Once more, Galopin arrives at Cheltenham looking to take his streak to four on the bounce.

    Irish dominance has been the fulcrum of success but it would unfair to class this French gentleman as a bad traveller even if there is little evidence in his defence.

    There will be just an element of doubt in the mind however, that since debut just one win has come away from his adopted shores of the Emerald Isle.

    The fact remains though, that in eight outings since Cheltenham 2021, just once have the spoils of victory not been sampled.

    With wins by 18, 13 and most recently, eight lengths on the slate, yes, Noble Yeats will have eyes on a Gold Cup-Grand National double but the sporting gods may be on hand.

    It may also be true that A Plus Tard will not surrender the crown lightly either; but Galopin Des Champs is very much the horse to beat to the festival’s most prized trophy.