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“Just accept it”.
Up to a point, Ginger.
It was bad luck Newcastle was abandoned. The race was rearranged but I am not convinced Henderson was ever that enthusiastic about running the horse so close to Boxing Day. The ground was the excuse he needed to pull him out.
The wider point is: can it be good for the National Hunt season as whole when so many of its star names are hardly seen until the second week of March? They are racehorses, after all.
While I can understand Henderson not running the horse today, why can’t the horse run somewhere between Boxing Day and March? Why not go for the Irish Champion Hurdle at the Dublin Racing Festival? Plenty of horses win or run well there and then win at Cheltenham.
It is a pity horses are campaigned so negatively now. Cheltenham has become a tremendous success but it is at the expense of the rest of the season.
I don’t have a problem with him not running him (even though he won the Tolworth on heavy ground – interestingly the time that day was just over 3 sec faster than today’s race which was 34 sec slow) but Hendo does a lot of the time make a rod for his own back by all this faffing around with a will he/won’t he scenario up until the last minute before making a decision.
We got that with the chasing issue being dragged on through much of the off season until just before the season started when they finally declared that after Aintree (which was April) it was pretty clear that he should stick to hurdling (which most of us thought at the time). That was following on from the utter nonsense of the start of last season when he pulled him out at Ascot on welfare concerns on ground that was good to soft.
Now we stumble into this issue where first it was too close to Christmas as a reason for not running him (which wasn’t seemingly an issue if the race had gone ahead as planned – what a difference a week makes) and then it morphed into well he is now more likely to run than not until it was then a, it will be dependant on the ground not being attritional (when it was already soft, heavy in places with significant additional rain forecast).
Had he stuck with his original statement of too close to Christmas so we will go straight to Kempton, some would have grumbled about it but accepted it and moved on but no it had to be dragged out until the morning of the race before deciding…..all so unecessary.
My question is now, what happens if Kempton’s Christmas meeting ends up being run on ground similar to today? Do we have a repeat of the will he/won’t he run in the lead up to the race or will he be happy to run on attritional ground knowing that he won’t run again until March (like last year) so he will have plenty of time to recover from a suposedly hard race?
Of course we won’t have a repeat of today, LD.
The whole point about pulling CH out today was that the heavy going takes more recovery time and it’s risking the horse either being not at his best on Boxing Day, or worse still not even running.There is clearly a long time between the Christmas Hurdle and the Champion. Therefore the ground is not an issue. If the going was good or good-soft at Kempton it wouldn’t be a surprise to see a change of racing plans with a possible run in late Jan / early Feb…
Might be a good idea to ask trainers if they’d like Newcastle moved to earlier, to allow more time between Fighting Fifth and Christmas Hurdle.
I have noticed over the years the trend of top trainers not running their horses many times before Cheltenham. Something first started by Irish trainers. Mullins and De Bromhead runners don’t seem capable of their best unless they’ve had at least 50 days off beforehand – and that’s whatever the ground is like in their “prep”. (So much so that when reading “50+ days” I add a bit to their chances). Irish trainers are worse than the British in wanting longer to prepare for Cheltenham. Suspect Henderson is getting more grief about it because there are so few top horses trained in Britain these days, people notice it more…
If Henderson wants to follow the trend of having 50+ days break before Cheltenham… and “only” around 78 days between Boxing Day and Champion Hurdle… means Constitution Hill would need to be out well within a month after his Christmas trip.
Value Is Everything“Can’t be the Greatest Hurdler Ever if you only race 3 times each season”.
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Running more often does not change the rating unless the horse improves its form.
Value Is EverythingTo me you need to see the horse, see it compete and get excited about it but as it stands there is nothing to get excited about. Having said that if he runs at Kempton there will probably still be nothing to get excited about I can only see his career as being well, none too exciting unless something comes out of the woodwork.
The more I know the less I understand.
I think maybe Henrietta Knight’s light campaign with Best Mate 20+ yrs ago in his Gold Cup wins might have been where the idea to only run sparingly first came to real prominence.
Before his first Gold Cup he ran just 3 times beforehand (all in November/December) and the following two years he ran just twice in November/December – Cheltenham was always his first run of the new calendar year and he had a total of just 22 career starts in the years he raced (from 4 to 10).
Trainers can be creatures of habit in that if a certain routine works they are liable to repeat it until it doesn’t work – Mullins with Al Boum Photo Gold Cup campaigns is a prime example by starting his season by going to Tramore on New Years Day and then straight onto the Gold Cup after.
A far cry from when Dessie (in each of his Gold Cup campaigns) turned up on the big day already having run 5 times previously.
Time was when a dual Gold Cup winner would have been a legend in Ireland; I can barely recall Al Boum Photo’s name myself, and if you mentioned it to the average person, even those with an interest in sports, you’d receive only a blank stare.
‘If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change.’“Irish trainers are worse than the British in wanting longer to prepare for Cheltenham.”
But the Big 3 Irish trainers are all prepared to run their best horses at the Dublin Racing Festival, considerably less than 50 days before Cheltenham. I expect the good prize money on offer influences their decision but results show running there does no harm to prospects in March.
Britain should introduce a big midseason festival as well. Our National Hunt season does not really work anymore, although I suppose that is partly because most of the best horses are trained in Ireland now. It is difficult to get excited about a Grade 1 won by a horse just three weeks off turning 12 years old, defeating only three rivals.
“Trainers can be creatures of habit in that if a certain routine works they are liable to repeat it until it doesn’t work – Mullins with Al Boum Photo Gold Cup campaigns is a prime example by starting his season by going to Tramore on New Years Day and then straight onto the Gold Cup after.”
Mullins stumbled on that routine by accident. The horse was declared to run at the Dublin Racing Festival but he was a late non runner because the ground was considered too fast. He then won the Gold Cup and Mullins decided to keep to the same routine next year.
Will Constitution Hill run in the same going if it was the Champion Hurdle??
Eh, yes, its why they didn’t go chasing
We get the same trainers/owners winning the grade 1’s that’s not good for racing
The trainers/owners that win all the grade 1’s pull the horse out so someone else wins a grade 1 and that’s not good for racing…
Gaelic Warrior Gold Cup Winner 2026
Adjust the price money …. Ok if you want to win a Champion hurdle with 1 or 2 prep runs be prepared to have less than say a horse who’s ran 3 or 4 times …. We have to see these horses more , if I pay to watch Messi he won’t not play because it’s muddy or raining
Pick 3 on Saturday champion 2025/2026
Cut the number of Gd1 races; and think about having to qualify for races at Cheltenham……Something drastic is needed if we want to see horses run more often….moaning won’t help.
Nicky tends to be conservative/ rigid with his race plans….we even saw that yesterday when discussing Jonbon’s future plans; Clarence House or Game Spirit. Why not both, and the Desert Orchid as Christmas……like would have happened once upon a time.
“But the Big 3 Irish trainers are all prepared to run their best horses at the Dublin Racing Festival, considerably less than 50 days before Cheltenham”.
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Are they?
The Big 3 Irish trainers run some top class horses at the Dublin Festival, CAS… But that’s because they’ve got so many top class horses. By no means do they run anywhere near all of them. It would take a long time to go through all Mullins or Elliott’s Cheltenham Festival Grade 1 winners… So just take Henry De Bromhead. If the Dublin Festival was a target for the vast majority, then it is a bit of a surprise that 6 of his 10 individual Cheltenham Festival winners won off more than a 50 day break… And 3 of them have been multiple Cheltenham winners off 50+ breaks (4 if including Envoi Allen’s previous Ballymore victory when with Gordon Elliott.Sizing Europe – Off 80 days before the 2010 Arkle.
Balko Des Flos – Off 77 days before the 2018 Ryanair.
Put The Kettle On – Off 114 days 2020 Arkle and 80 days 2021 Queen Mother.
Bob Olinger – Off 63 days 2021 Ballymore and 60 days 2022 Golden Miller.
A Plus Tard – Off 80 days 2022 Gold Cup who’d previously been successful in the novice handicap when being off 58 days.
Envoi Allen – Off 80 days 2023 Ryanair who’d previously won the Ballymore for Elliott after being off 66 days.
Being off more than 50 days can no longer be thought of as a negative, indeed for the main trainers – and one particular small(ish) Irish trainer who will remain nameless – it can be a positive.
Value Is EverythingWhat exactly has Nicky Henderson have against sending horses to Ireland? It seems to work perfectly well in the opposite direction at Cheltenham. He bemoaned the fact that the Nicky Henderson benefit hurdle worth only 17 grand had been discontinued at Sandown as it stopped him farming the race with long odds on shots.
He could run Jonbon & Constitution Hill on the same card at Leopardstown for 3 times and 6 times the prize money he could win here.I wonder what he tells JP, if he wants to see his horse at the DRF.
“No JP, this horse can’t leave GB.”
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