Diva Luna jumps the last en route to glory at Cheltenham

Ben Pauling on Cheltenham Festival hopes including Diva Luna and Pic Roc

By Sporting Life

Horse Racing

Thu February 27, 2025 · 10M ago

Ben Pauling is looking forward to sending a small but select team to the 2025 Cheltenham Festival, headed by Diva Luna.

A daughter of Diamond Boy, Diva Luna was a Grade 2 bumper winner last term and heads into the Grade 2 Ryanair Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle as a general 12/1 shot having won one of her three starts over obstacles this term.

Beaten into second at a very short price at Sandown last month, Pauling feels there is a lot more to come in a couple of weeks’ time.

The trainer said on Thursday’s Nick Luck Daily: “Diva Luna has come back to her best.

"I think if she’d been the filly that I thought she was going to be this season, then I think she’d have been favourite for the mares’ novices’ hurdle.”

Pauling also has a particularly high opinion of Mambonumberfive who is entered in the Fred Winter Juvenile Handicap Hurdle on the opening day of the Festival.

Pulled-up behind Triumph favourite East India Dock on his UK debut at Prestbury Park on Trials Day, the €450,000 import immediately put that flop behind him when defying odds of 10/1 in last weekend’s Ladbrokes Adonis Juvenile Hurdle.

Explaining the turnaround in fortunes at Kempton, Pauling said: “He was obviously an expensive purchase from Arqana. He came across and looked a very smart individual straight away, he looked like a raw, young French horse. For a French horse, he was carrying a nice amount of condition but compared to what ours would look like, he was a million miles away, so we gave him time to mature and strengthen which he did really well.

“We gave him time, thinking this wasn’t really going to be his season as he’s such a big horse, but I took him to Cheltenham, knowing he was a very good horse as his work at home was good, but in all honesty I was probably being impressed by what I saw at home and he wasn’t fully fit. I hadn’t given him enough graft.

“He pulled too hard at Cheltenham too, so we put a line through that and decided to go again, with him much fitter at Kempton.

“We rode him to finish nicely and Ben Jones found himself with a double-handful (of rein) leaving the back straight and that was that. He put the race to bed pretty quickly and did what he needed to do. He’s a nice, honest type who will keep on improving I would hope.”

Highlighting the Cheltenham claims of one other from his yard, Pauling gave a positive mention of a seven-year-old with entries in the National Hunt Challenge Cup Novices’ Handicap Chase and the Grade 2 Jack Richards Novices’ Limited Handicap Chase.

“Pic Roc is a novice chaser who hasn’t yet won, but I think he’s spot-on and coming to boiling point,” he said.

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