- This topic has 169 replies, 37 voices, and was last updated 3 years, 10 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
Nicky henderson seems to be going down the pat Kelly route with champ
Run his RSA winner in a hurdle race as a prep for the gold cup
If this was over 2m 4f I would be all over Saint Calvados and Waiting Patiently like a rash, but it isn’t and I don’t think this is the contest you need to be trying out your stamina.
Cyrname beat a 161 (since downrated a pound) and 146 (now 151) in the Charlie Hall and needs to be step up considerably on that.
Clan Des Obeaux looks a solid enough favourite and is an obvious choice, but I’ll take a chance with SANTINI. His trainer is very good at waffle and I suspect rates this one as having more chance than he lets on. Form looks solid enough and while this isn’t a stiff track it’s not sharp either.
Yep agreed. Santini is one of the most underrated and wrongly judged horses in training. Everyone seems to base their negativity towards him on his photo win over now mcginty and his loss to lake view lad. Both on seasonal debut where it’s been made very clear he’s a horse that always needs a run or 2 to get fit. So if you take those 2 runs out of the equation his form is rock solid.
I think he is a rock solid each way bet and a top class animal but having said all that he will be better suited by the gold cup in March. A running on place here I think would be a great effort and prep for the gold cupThis became an unnecessarily deep dive. Apologies to all.
I have also just talked myself out of Saint Calvados. I thought he was one of the unluckiest losers of this year’s Cheltenham Festival and expect Gavin Sheehan doesn’t enjoy seeing that replay – really should have won. Upgraded even further for going close under a hold-up ride given the New Course chase track is such an absurd front-runner’s paradise these days. I’m fairly confident Saint Calvados will stay three miles but this is just such a huge ask for other reasons. To come out without a warm-up run for such a toxic yard under a cloud seems a huge ask against such proven stayers who have had smooth preparations. And he has hung left quite a few times in his career including that Ryanair near miss. You could say “it’s in the price” at 20/1 but I don’t know if that’s true. Feels like “beaten after a circuit” is a huge part of the possible results pie chart with this horse on Saturday.
So what then? I think the single best piece of form on offer remains Cyrname‘s 2019 Ascot Chase win, with the beaten horses all seemingly running somewhere near their 160+ ratings despite being tanked out of sight. The fact that he has only run three times since (twice below form and once near his best but taking a notable market drift at a time when Paul Nicholls horses were well ahead in terms of fitness) makes me edgy though. I’d bet him if I was 10 years younger and still in the recreational mode of NEEDING a bet in every big TV race, but nowadays I’m more gunshy and selective.
Clan Des Obeaux? A fairly reliable operator nowadays but I wonder if his official rating of 171 is a little flattering. He is essentially vulnerable against any real star quality. His two King George wins don’t appeal as that solid either. A narrow verdict over the 10yo remains of Thistlecrack and a default winner of a non event as the only horse to run his race last season.
Lostintranslation – hmmmm. It was hard to fault his novice season as he mixed it with the best at 2m 4f and made light work of some good horses in the 3m novice at Aintree. Then a smooth progression through the Betfair Chase before the wheels fell off in this race last year. He revived well enough to take 3rd in what I see as a fairly unsatisfactory Gold Cup (better placed than most bar the winner but offset against a good run at a time when Tizzard was struggling). Colin Tizzard’s woes have continued into the early part of this season and it just depends how you read his Betfair Chase effort. Worryingly below par and a race that might leave a mark on a horse with breathing problems, or a nice prep for this main target? It’s a sketchy enough profile for me to baulk at 8/1.
Real Steel – again I do think there’s something fraudy and misleading about his somewhat eyecatching Gold Cup run. I think any fairly useful non-stayer would run a similar race in a slowly-run Gold Cup. I always think that’s one of the biggest mistakes people make when reading races: seeing a horse travel well facing a test it doesn’t stay and then overplaying that as a positive for a return to shorter.
I did scoff at Santini being supplemented at first but am really warming up to him now. His Kauto Star run in 2018 wasn’t too bad in hindsight. I viewed (I suppose rightly once her limitations were exposed) La Bague Au Roi as a fraud or “now horse” at the time – she dictated and outbattled a couple of slower and less battle-hardened horses and you couldn’t really mark Santini down in defeat. Then his RSA run I marked up as arguably better than Topofthegame’s winning performance given the awful preparation he had endured. He hasn’t done a great deal wrong since – two unsuitable small field events (won one), a Pillar win and arguably the moral winner of a Gold Cup not run to suit at all. The track isn’t ideal but Frodon and Cyrname will presumably set at least an even gallop. And there’s nothing to stop Nico de Boinville being more aggressive than usual on Santini, surely well worth a try in these circumstances. I think there’s reason to believe he’s a 5-10lbs better staying chaser than Clan Des Obeaux (Santini possibly a 175 horse if ever getting a perfect set-up in my opinion and Clan Des Obeaux a high 160s horse in his ideal conditions). Put them into my mental computer at 2/1 and 6/1 and you’ve got to bet Santini.
Black Op…amusing to see one the Twitterati were talking up as a Gold Cup winner 2 years ago now a 100/1 shot in a race like this. Hard to have sympathy given connections.
Frodon – thought it was the training and placement performance of the season from Paul Nicholls to win that £30k pot at Cheltenham with him. At a trip he doesn’t totally stay, under a great ride as the fittest horse in the race. He really ought to come up short on ratings here and has to shrug off a bad run.
Waiting Patiently has been one of my favourite horses but probably has a slightly lesser chance than Frodon all things considered. Even his best achievements look a bit questionable in hindsight – Ascot Chase win over the remains of Cue Card, third in a very suspect Tingle Creek and crucially absent for a year. I’d love to see it and admire Ruth Jefferson for being a rare Northern trainer trying to do more than pick off soft targets, but he won’t be carrying my money.
Santini 6/1 for me
“there’s nothing to stop Nico de Boinville being more aggressive than usual”
There is
A big slow lazy dope of a horse called santini
I’ll be a amazed if santini is in the first 3 , he,ll be flat out when they kick between the 3rd and 2nd last , as for him being a 175 horse , then so is lostintranslation on the GC form and he has a higher cruising speed and turn of foot than santini
I can definitely see Santini staying on well to place, but just can’t see him not finding at least one better.
Too much guesswork involved for me to bet on Cyrname. Wouldn’t surprise me if he galloped away from the field to win untroubled by 6 lengths. Also wouldn’t surprise me if he starts peddling backwards again half way down the run in. The Charlie Hall given the way it was run, still leaves me with question marks re trip.
Can’t get LIT’s performance in this last year, together with the Betfair run, and the Tizzard’s current form out of my mind. That’s three minuses, so despite thinking he could well bounce back to form here I can’t bring myself to back him either.
Real Steel could go well if his jumping improves from the run at Ascot. All the others have issues with the track, trip, prep, or plain ability.
Which leaves me with CDO. Who must be the most likely winner.
I also think CDO is the most likely winner , it’s his GC and like BDM at haydock it’s where he thrives , LIT hated the ground last time so I can forgive that , if the GC LIT turned up then he,s the biggest danger , cyrname and santini the lays , I’m not convinced the first stays a proper 3 miles …the former needs farther …a lot farther
It’s been CDO for months for me, but that 13-2 for Santini looks like a massive price to me, so he’s my main selection.
I couldn’t leave Waiting Patiently alone either, and I took 20-1.
Great line up this year.
Clan Des Obeaux 5s ew. Keeping the faith.
The 2 Simons (Rowlands and Holt) think Santini will win btw.
Both now known as the simple Simon’s ….he’s not fast enough and that last run was miles off being good enough to be competitive in this
It’s funny, I often see the Santini quotes from bloggers that Santini needs it very soft but Henderson said in his Cheltenham Gold Cup preview that “the better the ground the better he’ll be”.
People that haven’t jumped on the ‘he’s slow’ bandwagon and some of the racing journalists/columnists have admitted that Santini isn’t as slow as they thought because he was able to nearly win a slowly run Gold Cup on mainly good to soft ground.
If the race was at Cheltenham he would be my selection in this, regardless if it was good to soft or softer.
So besides Saint Calvados I also backed Cyrname. I think he should win it. Last year his race with Altior was so cruelling, but this year his win in the Charlie Hall was zo much smoother. With odds-boost Betfair gave 3-1. Really looking forward to his race anyway!
Cyrname 3/1
Saint Calvados 33/1 EWMike the reason he didn’t win the GC was because of the ground he lost when they kicked for home ….because he’s to slow
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.