Any Second Now tuned up for this third attempt at the Aintree Grand National by winning Navan’s Webster Cup for a second time.
It was a big Cheltenham for the little guy. A bunch of trainers who normally toil far from the limelight while the glittering prizes go elsewhere beat the big battalions to enjoy a finest hour in the Cotswolds.
Just the 359 days till Cheltenham 2024. If you don’t get the fascination, that’s fine, it’s not my job to persuade anyone. I wouldn’t go out the back door to watch the Super Bowl.
From the threshold of disaster, they played chicken with the field.
What a week it was at the Cheltenham Festival, with many more equine memories created that will live long in the minds of racing fans. Here are the stand-out moments as we look back at the winners and losers over a fascinating four days at the Cotswolds.
Galopin Des Champs’ Gold Cup victory proved the jewel in the crown as Willie Mullins and Paul Townend once again secured the top trainer and jockey honours at the Cheltenham Festival.
Impervious battled to a well-earned success in the Mrs Paddy Power Mares’ Chase, as Colm Murphy returned to the Cheltenham winner’s circle.
Prolific point-to-point winner Premier Magic, trained and ridden by Bradley Gibbs, sprang a 66-1 shock in the St James’s Place Festival Challenge Cup Open Hunters’ Chase.
Willie Mullins might have won just about everything this great sport has to offer – but the most successful trainer in Festival history admitted to feeling a level of pressure he has never previously experienced ahead of Galopin Des Champs’ victory in the Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup.
St Patrick’s Day got off to a raucous start for the legions of Irish racing fans at Cheltenham as Lossiemouth easily justified favouritism in the JCB Triumph Hurdle.
The big one. The Gold Cup. The blue riband of the Cheltenham Festival.
How did you get started in racing?
The Boodles Gold Cup will celebrate its centenary next year but not since its inaugural running in 1924 – when Red Splash came in first – has it been won by a horse trained in Scotland.
Mark Walsh didn’t know whether he would make the Cheltenham Festival a few weeks ago due to injury but his hard work was rewarded when steering Sire Du Berlais to a shock 33/1 success in the Stayers’ Hurdle yesterday.
Rachael Blackmore can do little wrong around Cheltenham but trainer Henry de Bromhead paid tribute to her exploits off the track having guided Envoi Allen (13/2) to Ryanair Chase glory yesterday.
Last year’s Gold Cup was more a ballet than a brawl, and it played right into A Plus Tard’s speedy hands. There is a time in every champion’s life when they have it all. That was A Plus Tard last year. It doesn’t look the same this year, and I expect a few horses to try and take a hammer and a blowtorch to this race.
A critic once described Bundini Brown as someone who would “take the dimes off a dead man’s eyes and put back nickels”.
It’s all about the Gold Cup on the final day of the Cheltenham Festival as Galopin Des Champs bids to back up the hype by etching his place in racing history.
I backed Willie Mullins’ Galopin Des Champs in the Turners Novice Chase last year at the short odds of 5/6 – and as he stormed clear in the final stages, I was sure the money was in the bag.