Feel Gut wins at Warwick and slashed for Triumph Hurdle

Sent off the 4/7 favourite for the Hazelton Mountford Insurance Brokers EBF Junior 'National Hunt' Hurdle, he was taken to the front by Nico de Boinville and always looked in control.

Sent into a clear lead after turning for home, he jumped out of his rider’s hands at the second last and came home six-and-a-half lengths clear of Majeur Allen.

Paddy Power and Sky Bet cut Nicky Henderson's charge to 12s for the Cheltenham feature immediately afterwards.

Henderson said: “Nico said he is quick. He is nice because he is not fancy. I could have run him a month ago, but I was waiting for him to show me something. We have waited with him a little bit as he is a big baby. He has got an enormous amount of scope and he will jump fences. He is lovely.

“Nico said there was no pace so there wasn’t much point in doing anything else. He is a great jumper. Everybody is happy. I was a bit nervous as he doesn’t run around saying look at me every morning. That was nice to watch.

“He can win this and still run in a novice hurdle next season. You could run in another one of those and still run in a novice hurdle next season or the other option is to run him in something decent.

“We have to think about it quite carefully. You might think of the Adonis, or something like that, to find out if he is a Triumph Hurdle horse, but we still have some other four-year-olds to come. He hasn’t lost his maiden technically so we have got options.”

While Henderson was delighted with what he saw from Feel Gut, he admits the prospect of testing ground at Cheltenham on Saturday is less than ideal for Sir Gino.

Having missed the end of last season with a setback the gelded son of It’s Gino made a triumphant return to action with a stylish win in the Grade One Ladbrokes Christmas Hurdle.

As result of his win at Kempton Park on Boxing Day it saw Sir Gino propelled to the head of the market for the Unibet Champion Hurdle, which he is the general 5/4 favourite for.

He said: "Everybody is nervous. You get yourself into these positions and now you have got to hold it and we have got to get on and come through these things. It will be testing, and nobody wants to see a whole lot of horses walking up the hill at Cheltenham as it is not a good preparation.

“Ferraris probably don’t work in muddy fields, and it might well be hard work. I could have done without the rain. We want the trials as they are an important part of the build up towards March, but we don’t want desperately hard races in bad ground."

And as for tactics Henderson insists that he is relaxed if Sir Gino ends up dictating matters like he did on his comeback.

He added: “He made the running in the Christmas Hurdle purely because he was too fresh and nobody wanted to go on. He was just a bit gassy early on so they left him in front and he didn’t mind. He made it when he won the Desert Orchid when he won over fences so I don’t think it matters to him."

Golden moment for team Nicholls

Golden Son moved a step closer to an appearance at the Cheltenham Festival after defying a 307-day absence to land the Willoughby De Broke Open Hunters’ Chase.

The Paul Nicholls-trained eight-year-old, who was last sighted finishing third in a handicap chase at Newbury in March, defied his fitness fears with a solid round of jumping under Olive Nicholls.

With even-money favourite Jet Plane suffering a mid-race tumble in the three-mile prize, the 4/1 chance capitalised on his stumble to defeat Paul Marvel by six lengths.

And following the race Paddy Power introduced the winner at 25/1 for the St James’s Place Festival Challenge Cup Open Hunters’ Chase at the Festival.

The winning rider said: “To be honest I thought we would need it today and he had a lot of weight to carry on testing enough ground for him as he doesn’t want it too soft.

"I’m delighted and it was a really great place to start. Hopefully we can keep building on that.

“He missed one, but on the whole he jumped superb and he travelled really well. All he did was gallop to the line.

“I would say he would be more of a Cheltenham horse as all he does is gallop. "He is probably not brave enough for the Aintree fences, but you never know. We will get him out of the race and see where we are.”

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