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” What is the obsession with the white hurdles?
They are also used at Leopardstown, right? Looking back at this year’s DRF (both days) I found out that there was only one faller over them a horse called Zillow ridden by a very inexperienced jockey. How come Irish trained horses have fewer jumping issues? “
The Irish have been using them for longer and those in Britain are slightly different
Two Champion Hurdle winners fell in last year’s race – both clipping the top of the hurdle and just failing to react.
With the old hurdles, if you flicked the top of the birch, that would bend but the hurdle would stay in place…the padded ones bounce back. Brighterdaysahead clipped the hurdle just before Constitution Hill last year and it was bouncing back as the latter jumped it
I’ve just seen lots of very similar falls since the new hurdles were put in, including at Kempton recently
Is it the pride of an old man which will bring about the end of a great champion? For a year, Constitution Hill has been telling Nicky Henderson the same thing, but he will not listen. He seems incapable of accepting that a great champion serial winner at the highest level can unexpectedly develop a catastrophic fault. His response to something which is beyond his experience is denial. Any objective viewing of Constitution Hill’s three falls reveals a horse which has lost its confidence altogether. In the last race at Newcastle, he only managed one hurdle and fell at the second.
After the first fall at Cheltenham last year it was not unreasonable to believe that that was a one-off an event that can happen out of the blue for an unknown cause. But the second fall at Aintree was confirmation that something was seriously amiss. That third and last fall was a flashing red light.
“no other champ has had as many falls over hurdles in their entire career as he has had this year.” That was Chris Cook trying to explain it all in the Racing Post last December.
https://www.racingpost.com/news/the-front-runner/how-the-mighty-have-fallen-has-any-champion-lost-their-love-for-jumping-quite-like-constitution-hill-agRny4F7gOGo/
In that article he did go on to cite Istabraq’s two falls at the end of his career, at about the same age as Constitution Hill.Great actors can suffer from stage fright, which means they cannot perform. There is no explanation and for most it passes away after a time. For some, it is career ending. When it happened to Laurence Olivier, he went to the front of the stage and said, “I’m sorry ladies and gentlemen, I have been taken ill”. There is a long list of well known actors and performers, Hugh Grant, Alison Steadman, Stephen Fry, Barbra Streisand, Ian Holm, Lenny Henry, Juliet Stevenson, Tim Roth, etc.
Horses are sentient beings and we do not really know how they perceive themselves or the world. A trainer told me that when a horse has a bleed, it frightens it and it does not forget it. He said that those horses are never the same afterwards. Many comments here refer to the white topped, padded hurdles as a factor. That may be true and may be related to something that Constitution Hill once experienced, its perception, vision, judgement, any one of many unknown factors.
Constitution Hill has, for whatever unknown reason, then, developed a disastrous mindset about jumping hurdles. However many it jumps at Seven Barrows in training makes no difference. Unless Nicky Henderson can discover, incontrovertibly, what is causing Constitution Hill to make these elementary mistakes at hurdles in races, he would be wrong and foolhardy and more, to put the horse through what must be a nightmare for it again. There is a terrible risk that it could end in a tragedy that is not worth taking.
The horse is telling Henderson the same thing each time. He must listen and accept that there are some things about horses that have no explanation and which even he, the master of seven barrows, cannot remedy. He should be wise enough to know that.
Constitution Hill has surely given enough to its owner, Henderson and indeed to all of us who revere it.
Well put Sungold , I used Bristow and his Dartitis earlier in the thread as an example of how despite being the very best such an ailment will finish you
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It’s a very good analogy. He has the equine equivalent of the yips and doesn’t know when to take off.
Hendo & Buckley should be fully prepared for the backlash should something go seriously wrong in the Champion Hurdle. The animal rights brigade could make their life hell. To be honest I could no longer defend the sport and would struggle to sympathise with their decision to run.
If the worst for happen then I’m imagine it would speed up his retirement , I disagree with his Henderson has dealt with the hill however he’s still in a different league compared to Elliott and how his actions seem to have been brushed under the carpet , I’m actual still uncomfortable listening to him do a interview because I don’t believe he’s changed , thank God for Mullins
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There’s a discussion to be had about number of completed starts prior to competing in a Grade 1 – if a horse can refuse a couple of times on the flat and be forced to undergo stalls testing..
I wonder if they’re schooling him to clear his hurdles like a chaser because, if fit and succeeds with that, then he’d still probably win if losing half a dozen lengths in total on his previous Champion Hurdle win.
Personally, I wouldn’t risk it and I’d be mapping out a flat campaign.
I would think it’s almost unanimous on this forum that Constitution Hill should not be running in the Champion Hurdle: the repercussions were he to suffer a serious injury, or worse, would be catastrophic. I backed him twice ante post, but that was before the horse’s reappearance fall at Newcastle – I would rather lose my money than see the horse fatally injured and the sport’s reputation in tatters.
It all reminds me of Malinin at the Olympics. A master of his craft who suddenly lost whatever it was that was making him the greatest of all time.
First they made the hurdles white as apparently horses see that colour easier then orange. Then they changed them to white rubber style hurdles, these that bounce back as did on constitution Hill in last year’s champion hurdle.
Saying the runner ones are safe then old birch as showed to cause less injuries, cuts etc. unsure though as seem to be seeing a lot more rotational falls at them at speed
VF x
Im going against the grain here, if I was Constitutions owner id let him run.
But, rather than being up with the pace, drop him out and let him gain confidence over the first four hurdles.
That way hes not taking them at championship speed to start with and can grow into the race. If he was not comfortable jumping during the race, pull him up. Istabraq’s last race at Cheltenham was just a jog round.
Then if in contention coming down the hill, then use that kick he showed on Friday night after the last flight and catch those trees that are entered, as its a poor race this year.
As they tried at Newcastle … when he fell at the 2nd … at no pace
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Buckley said, “Somebody actually involved in the Champion Hurdle – and I’m not going to go any further than that – called me yesterday to say how happy they were to see the horse back. And said they wouldn’t dream of telling me or Nicky what to do, Nicky is so experienced with horses, but his last words to me were ‘I hope you run at Cheltenham, because to be honest for anybody who wins that race, it’ll be hollow without you there as you’ve got the best horse’.”
Yay the Hill is the moral winner. Let’s just hand connections the trophy now, not make him run, he stays safe and whoever passes the post first on the day can go to the well earned runner up spot, after all who would want a hollow victory? Just look at the miserable faces of Golden Ace’s connections in the winners’ enclosure last year, looked as if they were getting handed a trophy made of poo for all it was worth.
I guess Dessies owner said something similar about Dessie prior to his first run in the Gold Cup, something like ‘for the race to have the prestige it should have he needs to run in it’.Having said that Dessies connections didn’t have the arrogance that Constitution Hills have.
whoever called Buckley sounds a right city banker ….
Pick 3 on Saturday champion 2025/2026
His potential on the flat is currently untapped at this stage, if a far inferior hurdler like Wicklow Brave can transition to the flat and win and be placed in two Irish St Legers, be placed in an Ebor, Lonsdale Cup, Ormonde, Long Distance Cup and finish 4th in two Goodwood Cups then it is not that much of a stretch to think that CH potentially could be more than just ompetitive in those same type events.
CH is already a Champion Hurdler and while talent wise he is the best horse in the race it matters not a lick if you can’t jump the hurdles and his mistakes have been exactly the same in each fall, he starts to come up off a long stride and puts down midway through it and lands on the hurdle halfway up it.
Hendo has said before each and every one of those falls that his schooling had gone really well and yet he has hit the deck each time – there is absolutely no way that Hendo can be sure (other than pure hope or wishful thinking) that CH’s jumping issue have been resolved (off the back of another good schooling session at home with Yogi) and to continue hurdling with the horse now is tant amount to training malfeasance.
Deciding his correct future path is not rocket science, yet connections are trying desperately to talk themselves and by proxy the horse into doing something that all recent indicators are screaming at them to avoid at all costs.
They talking Melbourne Cup i see in RP . If they really think hes a chance and they not talking crap theres no decision. One race worth peanuts in world racing , one ten times as much . The trophies alone worth three times Champion Hurdle purse .
100k plus crowd on course , massive week whole country buy into v a jumps race hes already won and now hes a kamakazi jumper .
If he gets into Melbourne Cup and theres a decent chance he gets sone give in ground he could absolutely bolt up , he could be levels above any Aussie plodder .
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