Ben Linfoot looks ahead to Cheltenham Trials Day, a big day for Chantry House, Champ, Jonjo O'Neill Jr and, potentially, Nick Williams.
Chantry has to deliver in the Cotswold
The Sky Bet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle will be many a racing fan’s favourite race. Sure, it’s bound to be given it’s the curtain raiser to the Cheltenham Festival, but it’s also a window to the future, a breeding ground for champions.
The revered 2011 renewal takes some beating on that score. Sprinter Sacre and Cue Card were only third and fourth, before charging to 17 subsequent Grade One victories between them. But what about 2015 when Douvan had future Gold Cup hero Sizing John back in third? That pair won 11 subsequent Grade Ones. And a year later we had Altior beating Min and Buveur D’Air, a trio who racked up a further 24 top-level races collectively.
With those races in mind the 2020 renewal looks positively inferior with just seven subsequent G1s, so far, but there’s a strong feeling that number is only going to swell. The sixth home, Edwardstone, has one in his back pocket and is second-favourite for the Sporting Life Arkle, while goodness knows how many the kamikaze-but-talented Asterion Forlonge might’ve collected if he cut out the crucial errors.
Quite clearly, however, it’s the Nicky Henderson-trained pair, that were first and third, that have the potential to seriously expand the top-level haul of the 2020 Supreme Novices’. Shishkin, obviously, looks a Grade One monster after his exploits at Ascot last weekend, but stablemate CHANTRY HOUSE is only one G1 behind him and Cheltenham Trials Day, this Saturday, looks a very important next step.
It’s only a Grade 2 trophy that’s up for grabs in the Paddy Power Cotswold Chase, but if he’s got pretensions of joining Shishkin on the Grade One train he’s got to be winning this on his way to a tilt at the Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup.
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His form in the spring looked dubious at the time. Hot favourite Envoi Allen fell at the fourth in the Marsh Novices’ Chase at Cheltenham, before Harry Skelton had a rush of blood to the head and set things up nicely for him on Shan Blue. At Aintree he was left clear when Espoir De Romay fell two out.
But the exploits this season of some of the horses that he beat at both Cheltenham and at Liverpool – Fusil Raffles, Asterion Forlonge, Shan Blue, Darver Star, Fiddlerontheroof and Sporting John – gives his novice achievements a much more solid look and the time to announce himself in open company is now.
The opposition looks inferior. Aye Right is a good horse and Ahoy Senor is a good novice, but both have had jumping issues and Chantry House was smooth in that department during his Festival win. With the unseasonal good to soft ground in his favour, too, everything is set for him to gain a confidence booster ahead of tougher assignments.
The Gold Cup could do with another UK challenger announcing himself. Royale Pagaille is the top-rated British-trained horse in the Gold Cup picture on 166 following his second Peter Marsh win last Saturday. Next in is Protektorat on 164.
Chantry House is sat on 160 at the moment, but he has the potential to be better than that. Time will tell. He looks like a horse that can add more to the G1 trophy haul of the 2020 Supreme Novices’ alumni, but he first has to prove the King George was a mere bump in the road, rather than something more serious.
Cheltenham Trials Day Snippets
Tizzard banishes January blues
Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool have had a good January on the back of some very poor Januaries. It’s the same with Colin Tizzard. In 2018 Tizzard had a bad January. He had four wins from 50 at 8%. In 2021 Tizzard had a worse January. He went 0 from 35.
This time around Team Tizzard have started the new year with a bang, winning eight from 37 at 22% so far this month. Sunday’s double at Lingfield courtesy of War Lord and Triple Trade highlighted the upturn in fortunes.
I’ll be looking out for Tizzard’s Saturday runners and he has two worth monitoring when the final declarations are through for Cheltenham; THE WIDDOW MAKER, in the opening handicap hurdle, who will like the return to better ground, and OSCAR ELITE in the Timeform Novices’ Handicap Chase.
He looks particularly interesting on what would be his handicap debut off a mark of 137.
Chance for O’Neill Jr to make his name on Champ
Jonjo O’Neill Jr has never ridden on Cheltenham Trials Day. Not at Cheltenham anyway – he’s usually at Doncaster for the Sky Bet Chase, having ridden Quarenta and Mister Malarky the last two years.
The latter is trained by the aforementioned in-form Tizzard and after an initial honeymoon period between Tizzard and O’Neill Jr, things went awry in 2021 – they teamed up for just three wins from 63 goes at 4.76%. As Tizzard’s January has flourished thanks largely to Brendan Powell, O’Neill Jr has been without a mount for the Dorset handler.
He’s been churning away riding for his dad, but if he needs a horse to fire him into the big time he could’ve done worse than stumble across an association with Nicky Henderson’s CHAMP, the odds-on favourite for the Welsh Marches Stallions At Chapel Stud Cleeve Hurdle at Cheltenham on Saturday.
Nico de Boinville took up the Champ baton when Barry Geraghty retired, but O’Neill Jr grasped his chance when riding him for the first time in the Long Walk Hurdle at Ascot last month – a first Grade One success for the jockey and a possible definitive one for the horse.
Champ screamed ‘keep me over hurdles’ that day, such was his fluency, and he gets the chance to cement a place in the Stayers’ Hurdle in the Cleeve, the most successful of all the trials from this day traditionally – eight of the last 15 Stayers’ Hurdle winners ran in the Cleeve on their previous start.
With O’Neill Jr already jocked up on Champ for the Cleeve it looks like he’s been given a chance to set fire to a burgeoning partnership - which could be a timely boost if he’s burnt his bridges with Team Tizzard.
Williams loves being on Trial
Nick Williams usually targets Cheltenham Trials Day. Right from his first runner on this card, Maljimar, who won the feature handicap chase in 2008, he’s been successful and has a totted-up Trials Day record of seven wins from 27 at 26% now.
He’s won the JCB Triumph Trial a couple of times thanks to Le Rocher and Galahad Quest and though this year’s renewal will be tough to win if both Gordon Elliott’s Pied Piper and Paul Nicholls’ Iceo turn up, Williams’ representative INTERNE DE SIVOLA should not be underestimated.
One thing he’s got that those big guns from Cullentra House and Ditcheat are missing is Cheltenham form – and it’s working out well. He beat Yorksea and Galah at Prestbury Park with ease and they have since won maiden hurdles at Fontwell and Doncaster, respectively.
And then there’s GALAHAD QUEST himself in the Paddy Power Cheltenham Countdown Podcast Handicap Chase, a race Williams won with Siruh Du Lac three years ago. He won’t mind the better ground and is starting to inch down the weights a little, as well.
