Ruby Walsh backs Cheltenham Festival changes
POSITIVE MOVES: Ruby Walsh expects the Cheltenham changes to have benefits outside of the Festival. Picture: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images
Ruby Walsh expects the changes to the Cheltenham Festival programme to bolster competitiveness and field sizes beyond just the four days in the Cotswolds.
Six key alterations have been made to Festival contests, with the two-and-a-half-mile Turners Novices' Chase replaced by a Grade Two limited novice handicap chase over the same trip and opening the National Hunt Chase, which has traditionally been contested by amateur riders, to professionals and turning it into a novice handicap chase for horses rated 0-145.
