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Majborough 13-8
The horse can’t jump but this is a very weak G1 and his massive engine will probably be enough. He got fairly close in the Hilly Way giving weight to a race fit Found a Fifty despite jumping quite badly left, and he was even worse at Punchestown but won easily. At least he’s going the right way round and doesn’t have much in the way of undulations to cope with.
Marine Nationale should like the ground but hasn’t had a prep run and got convincingly beaten in this last year.Made a complete mess of it with Solness last year, betting him twice, before leaving him for this. Happy to take the 12’s this time
Hercule Du Seuil is my idea of a Topham horse this year, I certainly think he’s better than we’ve seen, so just in case he’s not handicap bound, I’ll cover him here.
They’re the two I’m interested in, so might as well bet them now
Hercule Du Seuil 66’s EW3Pls
Solness 12’s EW3PlsMajborough is one of those horses I can’t see myself ever backing. Found A Fifty is way more reliable and good enough to take this. Solness could be a wild card, but I’ll just go with the one.
Well done VtC, horse really deserved that, good run. Marine Nationale did well to go so close after that mistake. Majborough jumped better than I thought he would but maybe not a 2 miler.
Majborough jumped scruffily throughout and then in run in Mark Walsh managed to run into solness and marine nationales back end.
Wonder if they go back hurdling, chasing is not his game.
Good win for Solness. Marine nationale made a terrible early error but still had every chance.
How did Marine manage to stay up after that mistake and then still nearly win. Unlucky.
This was just a race to watch for me. Came close to backing Solness but thought he’d need the run.
Marine Nationale has run a cracker after that mistake. Majborough needs to go back hurdling before its too late. Keeps his back end too low over fences and consistently puts his hinds legs through them. Very similar to El Fabiolo.
This race seems to be Solness’s Champion Chase as he is now a two time winner where he joins both Moscow Flyer and Simply Ned as the joint second most successful horse in the race (behind the 3 time winner Big Zeb).
Having watched the replay, Marine Nationale didn’t seem to make much of an actual jumping mistake at the fence (i.e. he didn’t hit it to where you could see any damage to the fence), it was more the fact that on landing the jockey seemed to become unbalanced as the horse went a bit to his left and then as he yanked hard on his right rein to get the horse back under him the horse went violently out to his right.
I think the fact that he finished so close confirms that he couldn’t have hit the fence that hard (if at all) and as it happened so early in the race he had enough time to recover and get back into the race and all things considered, it was a good comeback run.
To be fair to Majborough, his jumping overall was better today, he is pretty good off a long stride but like many long striding horses, he has more trouble shortening at his fences (where he looks awkward and a bit cumbersome and clumsy), all of that isn’t helped by him wasting a lot of energy by pulling too hard early on as well. It makes a jockey’s task a lot harder when you are both trying to keep a lid on him whilst also trying to get him to jump properly.
I do think 2m is his trip currently as going slower over further will simply encourage him to pull far more early on than he currently does – he probably needs a very strong end to end gallop over 2m which will allow him to settle better but you don’t always get those type of races so they either need to teach him how to settle better or just let him go from the front from the start and play catch me if you can.
Lets not forget that he is still only 5 turning 6 and a big unit at that so he may become more tractable as he matures
They’ll be delighted with Marine , it’s all about March and he’s going to take some beating
“It’s all about March”.
Not entirely disagreeing with you but what a sad verdict on the rest of the National Hunt season, with several Grade 1s and plenty of prize money on offer.
It’s not the season itself that’s the problem, CAS, as much as owners and trainers who sadly only care about Cheltenham.A lot of modern racing “fans” appear to be equally narrow-minded.
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