Bravemansgame heads eight entries for the bet365 Charlie Hall Chase at Wetherby on Saturday.
Paul Nicholls’ charge won the Grade Two contest last season before going on to land the King George at Kempton on Boxing Day and chase home Galopin Des Champs in the Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup.
He ended his campaign with another fine effort when third in the Punchestown Gold Cup.
The champion trainer has also entered Pic D’Orhy who signed off his 2022/2023 season with victory in the Marsh Chase at Aintree.
Ahoy Senor finished last of five in the 2022 Charlie Hall but won the Paddy Power Cotswold Chase at Cheltenham in January and chased home Shishkin in the Alder Hey Aintree Bowl in April. He heads the opposition.
Dan Skelton has entered both Midnight River and Sail Away, Mouse Morris could run Gentlemansgame and Dashel Drasher completes the field.
With significant rain forecast for the coming days, Wetherby’s clerk of the course Jonjo Sanderson expects conditions to be testing for the track’s two-day fixture.
He said: “We had six millimetres of rain overnight and I’d say ground is probably slightly nearer soft than good to soft. The weather forecast is mixed, to say the least. They’re saying we might get 5mm overnight tonight, 4mm overnight tomorrow night and then this storm is brewing.
“From Thursday into Friday it looks like being a wet 24 to 30 hours, so we’ll see what happens. At the moment they’re saying something between 15mm and 20mm of rain through that period.
“The track will take that, I would hope. Our issue is when we get heavy rain in a short period of time, the dykes lift up and you get water pooling on the track, as opposed to the track being waterlogged.
“I don’t think 20mm will cause that, it would be more like 40mm or 50mm. There’s nothing in the forecast at the moment that would give us concern, but if we get what’s on the horizon, the chances are we’re going to be soft ground Friday/Saturday.”
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