My Tent folded away for next year
It’s the time of year when a handful of jumps stars are ruled out of the coming core season with injuries of various kinds. Alas and alack, My Tent Or Yours has suffered this fate and will not be able to tilt at next month’s Fighting Fifth or the Champion Hurdle in March.
“Unfortunately he’s had an injury and I’m not going to get him back for Cheltenham [in March], so that’s it for the season,” Nicky Henderson has told the PA. “We were planning to stay over hurdles with him and we were looking at the Fighting Fifth, but that isn’t going to happen now.
“He’s not lame, he’s not sore, he’s not anything, really, but there is an issue there, unfortunately, which is very frustrating and very boring.”
My Tent Or Yours won three times last winter and failed by only a neck behind Jezki in the Champion Hurdle. His absence will make it significantly harder for Henderson to win back the champion trainer’s title from Paul Nicholls.
Today’s best bets, by Chris Cook
Kudos to any of you who have managed to arrange this as a day off from work. There’s three Group Ones from Newmarket and Cheltenham racing for the first time since spring, to say nothing of a decent card at Haydock and a card at Redcar. And there’s even Wolves tonight, if you’re chasing your losses (don’t chase your losses, kids).
Future Champions’ Day at Newmarket is on Channel 4, with the first race at 1.50pm, so you don’t need any fancy-Dan satellite subscriptions to join in the fun.
I’ve taken a contrarian view of the big races at Newmarket, where the going is soft after plenty of rain since Sunday. All three of the Group Ones have a short-priced favourite unproven on ground as deep as we expect it to be and you go skint showing unlimited faith in two-year-olds in that situation at the end of the season.
Capella Sansevero (2.55) is the Middle Park suggestion at 15-2. He loves the soft and can turn round the Phoenix form with Kool Kompany, who pipped him for second but would have been overhauled in another couple of strides. Andrea Atzeni rides for the second time and seemed to get on well with the colt when they won a Group Three last time.
There’s not much wrong with Lucida or Agnes Stewart, who head the betting for the Fillies’ Mile. But 11-1 about Together Forever (3.25) looks the value to me, considering the progress this Aidan O’Brien filly has shown in her five starts. Her best effort, powering home in a Listed on Sunday, also came on the softest ground she has encountered and this Galileo half-sister to Lord Shanakill has more to give.
Kodi Bear (4.00), my Dewhurst fancy, has been pricewised, so he’s down to 8-1 but that’s still fair about a colt who was fifth in the Coventry despite trouble in running. He improved for the extra furlong next time to win a Listed and has been saved for this since July.
It’s not a given that he will cope with the ground but Clive Cox’s horses are still running to form at this late stage of the season, which is not true of every major yard.
My betting interest at Cheltenham is restricted, unusually, to the amateur riders’ race. The 9-1 about The Young Master (5.00) is too big, given the strong current form of his trainer, Neil Mulholland, who won this race three years ago with the same rider as he uses today.
The Young Master, a five-year-old, remains well handicapped after hosing up on his chasing debut last time, when he was expected to need the run.
Tipping competition, day five
Our winners so far:
Monday
Langley House 9-2
Brave Spartacus 7-2
Latin Charm 7-2
Tuesday
Top Billing 11-10
Lucky Lodge 8-1
No Win No Fee 6-1
Wednesday
Goodwood Mirage 8-1
Hidden Gold 4-1
Lady Tiana 4-1
Thursday
Taaresh 5-2
Hollow Penny 9-1
Mubrook 7-2
And our leader is:
goofs +14
... though he had a winnerless Thursday and is now hard pressed by TheVic (+12.60), who had Taaresh and Hollow Penny. Other scores: Paragoncup +8.60, orso +8.10, Fixxxer +6, Sportingbest +6, BearRides +5.
For today’s thrilling climax, we’d like your tips, please, for these races: 3.15 Cheltenham, 3.25 Newmarket, 4.00 Newmarket.
This week’s prize is a copy of Timeform’s Chasers & Hurdlers 2013/14, the treasured annual from the long-established ratings firm, retailing at £75 and running to more than 1,000 pages. Each horse that ran last season is described and rated, while there are extended essays on 80 or so of the bigger names, in which Timeform’s writers reflect on the talking points thrown up by the last 12 months. If you don’t win this excellent prize, you can buy it here.
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. If you have not joined in so far this week, you are welcome to do so today, but you will start on -12.
In the event of a tie at the end of the week, the winner will be the tipster who, from among those tied on the highest score, posted their tips earliest on the final day.
For terms and conditions click here.
Good luck!
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