Paul Jones's daily Cheltenham Festival countdown stat
Paul Nicholls's Zarkander has been backed into near favouritism for the JCB Triumph Hurdle off the back of his Adonis Hurdle victory. However, if he were to be successful, he will become the least-experienced hurdler in the history of the race as there has no been no other Triumph winner to enter the race off the back of just one start over hurdles. First ran in 1965, all Triumph winners had run at least twice over timber and very few winners had also had as few as two runs.
Nicky Henderson would be the exception to the two-runs-is-too-few argument as three of his five Triumph winners only had two starts (his other pair had three runs so Grandouet would be a most unusual winner for him having had seven starts over timber). Celestial Halo also had only two runs.
Recent well-fancied horses to enter this race off the back of just one run (and win) were Master Of Arts for David Pipe and Mountain for Jonjo O'Neill who both started at a single-figure price and were, to put it bluntly, totally stuffed.
Paul Jones is author of The Cheltenham Festival Betting Guide published by Weatherbys. You can find details on how to order here.
Today's best bets, by Will Hayler
With next week such an unashamed orgy of racing and betting for me, I tend to try to go cold turkey as much as possible this week – and thankfully this is usually aided by the fact that, by and large, much of the racing in the days leading up to Cheltenham is absolute rubbish.
But I can feel my wallet trying to get out of my pocket today because there's surely no way on earth that Alla Svelta should be favourite ahead of Glassawine (2.00) in the opening race of the day at Newton Abbot.
Have you ever been to Newton Abbot? It's a nice place and the bookmakers do their best to drum up a bit of business. When I was there last year, a couple in particular were determined to stand out from the crowd and the formulaic "Betfair-minus-5%" prices.
If you have been, you'll know that it's not a track for stayers unless the ground is riding bottomless, but although recent flooding from the river has left the going soft on that bend, the course is quicker on the straights and drying all of the time with no rain forecast today.
That's going to help Glassawine, who has a much more Flat-orientated pedigree than some of these rivals and who started her career with a couple of solid efforts in one-mile five-furlong junior bumpers, being quietly supported on both occasions.
Moved up to this trip for her hurdling debut at Taunton last month, she jumped tidily and kept on well enough at the finish, without necessarily looking as if she wanted to go up any further in distance.
In contrast, Alla Svelta has a stouter-looking pedigree and came from some way back to snatch second over this trip at Exeter – a far stiffer track than this – on his penultimate start, before predictably being moved up in distance to two and a half miles at Ffos Las last time. He clearly has ability, but today's conditions will surely not suit as well as for the selection.
Even though the Tote ruined the bet for anyone other than the biggest players when putting the minimum unit stake up to 50p, I'll be slinging a couple of quid towards the Jackpot at Ffos Las today. Rarely will such a substantial rollover (should comfortably surpass half a million today) be carried forward to such a generally uncompetitive-looking card.
Tipping competition – a new week
Congratulations to Moscow08, who picked a 3-1 winner on Friday to cement his position as champion tipster of the week. However, he tells us he already has a copy of the prize, Paul Jones's Cheltenham trends book, so we will award it instead to the runner-up, millario.
This week's prize, kindly offered by those generous folks at totesport, is 16 lines into Saturday's Scoop6, for which there is a rollover of £285,000, plus £230,000 in the bonus pool.
To kick things off, we'd like your tips, please, for these races: 3.40 Newton Abbot, 4.00 Ffos Las, 4.35 Ffos Las.
As ever, our champion will be the tipster who returns the best profit to notional level stakes of £1 at starting price on our nominated races, of which there will be three each day up until Friday. Non-runners count as losers.
In the event of a tie at the end of the week, the winner will be that entrant who, from those tied for the highest score, posted his tips earliest on the competition's final day.
For terms and conditions click here. Good luck!
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