Re-examination of some previously held Cheltenham notions called for
The countdown to the Festival is now well under way and, in the largely irrelevant racing world which we inhabit, nothing else will really matter over the next 25 days or so!
Cheltenham, as usual, will be all pervading. We’ll have it for breakfast, dinner and tea and if a horse breaks wind in a less than delicate manner then the media will be full of the ‘story’.
There are times when you’d almost wish you could drift into a tasty sleep and wake up at the other side of the meeting.
But that’s not going to happen, so we may as well embrace, enjoy and just make the bloody best of it.
Anyway, what’s occurred of late that has made us sit up and re-examine some previously held notions?
Well, the performance of Michael O’Brien’s Forget The Past at Gowran Park on Saturday was rather significant. He easily beat the more than useful Jim and, in the process, gave a decent boost to our two major Gold Cup candidates, Beef Or Salmon and War Of Attrition.
Forget The Past’s previous run was in the Lexus Chase at Leopardstown at Christmas when beaten four lengths and 11 lengths into third behind those two horses.
It is always comforting when the form of a race begins to work out, but more particularly so this time round, I think.
It simply looks a bad Gold Cup and if you have a mild fancy for something and horses tied in with your choice start to win, then that is obviously encouraging. After all, a drowning man will grab onto a straw.
War Of Attrition is the horse in the field with the greatest scope, he’s only seven, and Mouse Morris will take comfort from the fact his charge beat Forget The Past by 11 lengths.
Incidentally, War Of Attrition did some decent work a week ago at Morris’, with Conor O’Dwyer in the saddle.
Remember a couple of weeks back we threw cold water in this column on Sweet Wake’s prospects in the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle.
The gist of it was that Noel Meade’s gelding may well be a flying machine, a real star in the making, but had beaten absolutely nothing in his two races over hurdles to date. Subsequent events, well one event actually, show that isn’t the entire story.
Sweet Wake beat Royaldou four lengths at Leopardstown at Christmas and was in no way flattered by the margin of victory, after Paul Carberry had only asked for the minimum in the closing stages.
The bare form of that race now looks a lot better. Royaldou subsequently contested the Grade One Deloitte Novice Hurdle at Leopardstown and again performed solidly to finish three lengths second to Mr Nosie.
Suddenly, a far more solid case can be made for Sweet Wake and persistent rumours he is capable of catching the proverbial pigeons at home have to be taken into account.
Indeed, one pro recently revealed that not even Harchibald could get Sweet Wake off the bridle up the Noel Meade gallops.
And then there’s Macs Joy and the smooth performance he produced when cruising to victory at Gowran Park on Saturday.
This was hugely encouraging for those of us who believe Brave Inca, who beat Macs Joy in the AIG at Leopardstown, is the bet of the meeting at Cheltenham in the Champion Hurdle.
* CHURCH ISLAND, a horse I have repeatedly underestimated, put up some display in that Grade Two at Navan on Sunday.
He didn’t have a very easy task, conceding weight all round, but winged his fences and scored in a canter.
I thought he got a very canny front-running drive from Andrew McNamara, who has made a lot of progress since going to ride for Michael Hourigan.
Don’t know if Church Island is capable of getting into the frame in the SunAlliance Novices Chase, but what you can say with certainty is he’s fully entitled to take his chance.
* NB: A rarity at Fairyhouse on Saturday and again at Naas on Sunday. The bumpers at the two meetings have attracted a combined entry of 59 and not one of them is trained by Willie Mullins!
