John Ingles looks at the hurdlers who have been given Timeform's 'x' symbol, a warning denoting poor jumpers.
‘With his hurdling, there’s such a fine margin, an inch every time, and you only have to get it wrong by half an inch. If you're so slick and accurate, you’re dangerously low, and the margin for error will always be there. He was an inch lower than he should have been I guess.’
Nicky Henderson was talking about one of his earlier Champion Hurdle winners, Buveur d’Air, not Constitution Hill, after the 2017 and 2018 winner had misjudged the third flight when going for a hat-trick of wins in the 2019 Champion Hurdle. That mishap proved a one-off in the career of Buveur d’Air who was a notably quick jumper of hurdles. But in Constitution Hill’s case mistakes have become a bad habit, with his latest fall in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle being his third in his last four starts.
‘Even monkeys fall from trees’ according to a Japanese proverb, and triple Champion Hurdle winner Istabraq, the only hurdler rated higher than Constitution Hill in the last 25 years or so, wasn’t entirely blemish-free himself. He suffered a couple of falls at Leopardstown late in his career, coming down at the last in both the December Festival Hurdle and the Shell Champion Hurdle which were both won by Moscow Flyer, though neither of those blips took much of the shine off his brilliant overall record.
Not so Constitution Hill, though. Quite how or why Constitution Hill’s jumping has gone to pieces, at least when he gets on a racecourse, is something not even his despairing trainer can fathom. It was formerly one of his greatest assets. Timeform’s internal database uses a ‘j’ symbol to highlight a performance when a horse has jumped notably well, or a capital ‘J’ when it has been particularly impressive in the jumping department. Constitution Hill earned one or other of the ‘j’ symbols in eight of his first ten races over hurdles, all of which he won.
‘His combination of cruising speed, tactical versatility and electric jumping at pace make him the complete package as a two-mile hurdler’ said the Timeform report on his win in the Fighting Fifth three years ago, his first start outside novice company. When he won the Champion Hurdle two starts later, it was noted that he ‘jumped impeccably’.
In hindsight, Constitution Hill’s blunder at the final flight in last season’s International Hurdle – out of character judged on his prior record – and where he managed to ‘find a leg’, was a warning sign for what was to follow in the Champion Hurdle and Aintree Hurdle where he wasn’t so lucky.
Constitution Hill’s latest fall means he gets an ‘x’ on his rating, the Timeform symbol that denotes a ‘poor jumper’. It is more usually applied to much less talented animals and is more common among chasers than hurdlers.
Only three other hurdlers on Timeform’s base with ratings in excess of 160 – deemed high-class or better – have been given the ‘x’ symbol. The New One was a tough and genuine sort who won 17 races over hurdles and over a million pounds in career prize money for Nigel Twiston-Davies. Those wins included three editions of the International Hurdle and four in the Champion Hurdle Trial at Haydock, as well as the Baring Bingham in his novice days, while his best placing from four runs in the Champion Hurdle was when third to Jezki in 2014.
The New One didn’t acquire his ‘x’ until a couple of seasons later when suffering the only fall of his career in the Aintree Hurdle (which he had won in 2014), though the report on that race noted that ‘his jumping has long since been a weakness’.
Reve de Sivola was another jumper who enjoyed a splendid career and, in his case, the ‘x’ on his rating over both hurdles and fences might seem a little harsh for a horse who never actually fell or unseated. Trained by Nick Williams, Reve de Sivola won ten races in all, having a couple of seasons over fences but tellingly going back over hurdles where there was less pressure on his jumping and where he made the Long Walk Hurdle his own, completing a hat-trick of wins in the Ascot Grade 1 in 2014, having survived a bad mistake at the third, and then finishing second when coming up against Thistlecrack a year later.
Reve de Sivola ended up shaking off the ‘x’ on his hurdles rating that he had first acquired as a novice. As well as a Grade 1 at Punchestown that season, he had also managed to win the Challow despite taking barely any of the flights fluently, though the very testing conditions at Newbury put the emphasis on stamina, which Reve de Sivola had in abundance, rather than slick hurdling.
Reve de Sivola’s win in the 2013 Long Walk had come after the odds-on favourite At Fishers Cross had stumbled badly and unseated Tony McCoy at the last, though that was by no means his only mistake in a round of jumping that left plenty to be desired. McCoy and At Fishers Cross, trained by Rebecca Curtis, enjoyed a tremendous novice season in 2012/13 when unbeaten in six starts, including the Albert Bartlett at Cheltenham and the Sefton at Aintree, having also beaten The New One in a Grade 2 novice at Cheltenham earlier in the season.
But At Fishers Cross never won again after his novice season, his jumping, which had largely been fine as a novice, becoming sketchy, though he did put in a couple of better rounds of hurdling when twice making the frame in the Stayers’ Hurdle.
Of course, the ‘x’ on Constitution Hill’s rating could prove academic, for the time being at least, if connections decide to abandon hurdling for now in favour of a try on the Flat. It would certainly be an unorthodox career move for a horse who began his career finishing second in an Irish point. But his sire Blue Bresil had an unconventional career too, rubbing shoulders with Henderson’s future Gold Cup winner Long Run in good company as a juvenile hurdler at Auteuil, having been deemed good enough on the Flat to contest races such as the Prix du Jockey Club and Arc.
More from Sporting Life
Safer gambling
We are committed in our support of safer gambling. Recommended bets are advised to over-18s and we strongly encourage readers to wager only what they can afford to lose.
If you are concerned about your gambling, please call the National Gambling Helpline / GamCare on 0808 8020 133.
Further support and information can be found at begambleaware.org and gamblingtherapy.org.
