Cue Card ‘deserves’ a King George title
The chaser will be rising 10 when he lines up at Kempton on Boxing Day and Tizzard was eager to laud his longevity.
Cue Card sprang to prominence as a four-year-old when winning the Cheltenham Bumper at 40-1 and has notched up a further four Grade One victories in the five years since.
He was forced to miss last year’s Cheltenham Festival with a trapped epiglottis, but Tizzard feels the corrective surgery has enabled him to bounce back to his best in winning the Charlie Hall and a second Betfair Chase this season. This year will be his fourth attempt at winning the King George, having looked all over the winner in 2013, only to be caught be Silviniaco Conti.
Tizzard said: “Cue Card’s epiglottis was operated on in February. That’s why we missed the Cheltenham Festival. When he had it really bad, he couldn’t even trot up the gallops. We think to a degree he had it the year when two out [in the King George], he had Silviniaco Conti off the bridle and his head came up and maybe it was trapping then.
“It’s saggy old skin and it actually trapped the air pipe. It was like a golf ball was stuck in his throat and he couldn’t breathe.”
Tizzard, assisted by his son, former jockey Joe, recently moved to new premises, which he feels has brought about an upturn in his fortunes.
“We’re up here in the fresh air in a bug-free area. Now we are up here, some of our horses have improved massively. It’s the same gallops, same feed, same people riding them, the only thing that’s different is being up here and I think that’s a significant factor.
“It’s never an easy race, is it? We’re looking forward to it. I think we’ve got more strings to our bow this time, we can let the others drag us in to the race.
“Very few horses have won at Haydock as easy as he has. He won with his head in his chest. I just have to make sure he’s fit and well. I would just love to win a King George. He’s been a damn good horse for five years now and he deserves to.”
Cue Card is 9-2 third favourite with the sponsors behind Don Cossack at 5-2 and Vautour at 3-1. Gold Cup winner Coneygree can be backed at 7-1 but he needs to be supplemented.
