Today’s best bets, by Chris Cook
Fans of cross-country races at Cheltenham, among whose number I count myself, will be pleased to learn that there is no evident threat to Friday’s race. The cross-country race scheduled for November’s race-meeting had to be abandoned because the going was hard in places after a dry autumn and it remains fast but, crucially, not quite as fast.
The cross-country going is currently good to firm, firm in places, which counts as raceable in jump racing. Even so, Cheltenham’s clerk of the course, Simon Claisse, will try to get ride of the firm bits with some judicious watering this week. Good luck to him, since the cross-country circuit has more twists and turns than the BHA’s pursuit of Jim Best.
The going will also be unusually fast for the time of year for the other races to be run at Cheltenham this week, Claisse describing the going as good but tending towards the faster end of that description. The action on Friday and Saturday will take place on the New Course, which has not been used since April and was therefore untouched by the watering campaign Claisse mounted ahead of the fixtures in October and November.
Claisse has been able to water the New Course and the cross-country course four times in the past three weeks and plans to do some more watering this week. There is hardly any rain in this week’s forecast for Cheltenham.
Today’s card at Ludlow has been abandoned after an overnight frost that is not expected to come out of the ground in time. That leaves a low-quality jumps card at Ayr and all-weather Flat action at Lingfield.
The obligation to identify a confident nap selection from such races is a challenging one. Still, I really like Encore D’Or (2.30), even at 7-4, for Lingfield’s sprint handicap.
Having his first run since a gelding operation, he quickened really smartly when a late gap opened in a good race at Chelmsford last time. Those sort of tactics work pretty well at Leafy and he may even have the race set up for him by Seve, who made all in a race of lesser quality last time.
Encore D’Or appears to have been improved by the switch to ‘sprint king’ Robert Cowell, who has been racing him since April. Against a collection of rivals who offer little in the way of recent form, it seems to me this is mainly a case of hoping that Shane Gray, who also rode last time, gets the tactics right. I can’t remember putting any significant faith in Gray before but I’m encouraged by his 30% record at Lingfield (13/43).
Desert Strike (3.30), 7-2 from an opening 11-2 for the six-furlong handicap that closes the card, has his own fine record at Ling, having won there nine times at a 24% rate. This is his first time back there since June, the last of three consecutive runs there in which he was either first, second or third.
Remarkably, he is now 12lb lower than the rating from which he was third that day, beaten less than two lengths. We all understand that 10-year-olds can lose their ability quickly but that kind of drop seems excessive to me, after just a handful of runs at other tracks.
He hinted at a revival when running on into third at Wolverhampton a fortnight ago. His draw in stall three of 12 should help.
Titian Boy (2.20) is my pick of a tricky Ayr card at 6-4. This 17-hands giant showed nothing over hurdles but, surprise, looks much better over a fence and dotted up in a handicap over this course and distance a month ago when sent over the large obstacles for the first time.
The chestnut has been clobbered with a 15lb rise that made him unattractive when I began looking at the race. But you’d have to work pretty hard to identify a rival with a clear chance of making the necessary progress to beat him and I think another romp may be on the cards. He’s 6-4.
