Easily the most popular winner of Boxing Day’s King George VI Chase would be Thistlecrack, now firmly into the loveable veteran stage of his career. He was the upstart when he won it as a novice chaser three years ago with a tearaway performance so impressive that he seemed to have the game at his mercy, a memory made poignant by the knowledge that he has not won since.
While the market has him pegged as a 14-1 shot and expects him to be run ragged by the flashy youngsters Cyrname and Lostintranslation, there is a sizeable gang of followers who have never lost faith: the Thistlecrackers, we might call them. They are given every reason for hope of a miracle at Kempton by the words of those close to the horse.
“He is working brilliantly at the moment,” says his trainer, Colin Tizzard, from his base on the Dorset-Somerset border. “Honestly, he is brilliant. He would be probably as good as anything on our gallop at the moment, if not the best.”
This is not what one expects to hear about an 11-year-old that missed the 2017 Gold Cup because of a tendon injury and the following year’s race with a stress fracture. When he finally got to the Cheltenham race in March, he failed to show anything like his best form and was pulled up for the first time.
But Kempton has brought out the best in him, notably in last year’s King George, when Might Bite, Native River, Politologue and Waiting Patiently were all better fancied. He beat them all and halfway up the home straight it looked as though he was going to pull off an improbable second success in the race. “I did think he was going to win it,” recalls Tom Scudamore, who has ridden him in every race since April 2015. “When Clan Des Obeaux came alongside, I was thinking he hadn’t always been the strongest of finishers. Unfortunately for me and Thistlecrack, he decided to turn over a new leaf that day.”
Clan Des Obeaux finished stylishly and had a length and a half in hand at the line over Thistlecrack, who was a dozen lengths clear of everyone else. The winner benefited from a hold-up ride and the result may have been different had Thistlecrack been able to save a bit more for the last half-mile.
But that has never been his way. When he won the 2016 race, he tore around Kempton in the manner of a child ripping open presents, as if there was no end to his energy and nothing to gain from restraint.
His prodigious leap at the second fence will live in the memory long after he is retired. If he had learned professionalism by then, he would have fitted in an extra stride and popped over, instead of exuberantly hurling himself through the air. It ought to have undermined his finishing effort but the laws of the game seemed suspended that afternoon.
“He’s been an awesome racehorse,” Scudamore says, “to have won so many Grade Ones and a King George as a novice. Obviously, through injuries and what-have-you, he hasn’t quite reached those heights we all thought he was going to do. It’s hard to know what to expect this time but I sat on him last week and he seemed in good order. He ran a cracking race at Newbury last month, which was a great pipe-opener because he needed it really badly. He’s normally going there as one of the favourites but this year it’ll be slightly different.”
Tizzard also trains Lostintranslation, whose chance is more obvious, and for a while it looked as though he would switch the older horse away from the King George back into the staying hurdle division he once dominated.
Only on Monday was the decision taken to have another crack at the midwinter championship race of steeplechasing.
“It would have been an easier option and who’s to say he won’t go back to hurdles after this,” says Tizzard. “But we talked about it with John and Heather [Snook, owners of Thistlecrack]. They kept him on the move all summer, kept an element of fitness in him, so that he could have one run and go to the King George. So we’re going to stick to our guns. He’s a big, strong, old-fashioned horse. I don’t think he’s finished for one minute.”
Tizzard is always softly spoken but his Dorset tones have been gathering conviction as he reflects on his horse’s chance. “I’m quite looking forward to him running.”
