I'm at Bristol's Memorial Ground tonight for the preview I mentioned the other week. Will probably not get time till the weekend to post anything detailed but will try to stick up the major talking points from the night if there are any.
Betfair Cheltenham Preview Night with Nicholls, McCain, Chapman & O'Brien- Link Below starts @ 7.30pm http://www.cheltenhamfestival.net/category/cheltenham-festival-news/watch-the-betfair-cheltenham-festival-preview-evening-live-online-201403050002/
Glad I nabbed 4/1 this morning on Briar Hill in a local bookie over here. Noticed he'd been trimmed across the board last night so decided to move quick. He's into 3/1 now with them No doubt this is the preview night effect, or dare I say it, the 'Pont Alexandre' effect as he was tipped up massively during the preview rounds and his price collapsed in the same manner the week prior to the Festival. Any good snippets from your preview last night Bob, or were you too busy brushing off strange looking people complimenting your 'salmon pink' jumper
I was swatting them away like flies on **** Beefy. The night was fairly poor actually. I drove 4 hours there and 4 hours back to listen to some knob on my table talk incessantly throughout. He obviously didn't realise we'd come to listen to Paul Nicholls et al give us a snippet of their thoughts. He didn't know his arse from his elbow either. The highlight was Melodic Rend's stable lad giving it the big one to Nicholls when they talked about Ptit Zig. PN gave Caid Du Berlais at 25/1 in the Martin Pipe (thank you - I took it and we're about 14/1 now). There was a strong word for Star Neuville as well.
Bob you gonna post a review at all? Did the stable lad have any decent info on Melodic either? Cheers
I'll try to get a review up but to be honest it's not worth doing. Tom Scu thought his novice hurdlers have serious chances. They do. He said Kings Palace was his best bet and his charity selection (along with Wishful Thinking). But they also have Tom Scu on their back and his main challengers have Ruby Walsh on their back. David Pipe to produce grade one winning hurdlers with Tom Scudamore piloting them or Willie Mullins to produce grade one winning hurdlers with Ruby Walsh piloting? I honestly don't even think it's worth debating when you boil it down to that most basic of levels. Nicholls said he's backed only 2 horses this year for Cheltenham. He'd been backing Big Bucks all year and Caid Du Berlais for the Martin Pipe. He got 33/1. We got 25/1 last night. You can only get 14/1 now so the price has gone and it's not a bet anymore. His Charity bets were Silviniaco and Caid Du Berlais. He sounded less than confident about BB now AP runs. The Henderson assistant might as well not have been there. He said Triolo D'Alene was his charity each wayer in the Gold Cup. He was confident of it being in the mix. Andrew Smith the bookie said all the right money was for Wicklow Brave in the Supreme but the price has gone. He also said some very intelligent money was for Rathvinden in the Neptune yesterday (a bet that he was asked to place for customer). He was basically trying to cast aspersions re: Faugheen's participation. Sounded like a bookie trying to work his way out of a hole to me but I could be wrong. Mullins was on the phone and said Hurricane Fly as his charity bet. Sure Reef in the Coral and Smashing in the County as his best handicap chances. The mc asked all the wrong questions of Mullins though and he was only briefly on. As I mentioned earlier Star Neuville was subject of very strong words but it was second hand and if you didn't already think he had a massive chance after the last day then you're in the wrong game anyway. Wonderful Charm was favourite of the English horses in the JLT. A note i've made from the vibe when they spoke of the World Hurdle was 'all very negative re Big Bucks including wobbly'. Age, Annie Power and At Fishers Cross (i give up if that nag wins a grade one race again) the main reasons BUT wobbly did say he is a lot fitter now than LTO. Calipto was given a favourites chance in the Triumph but he is favourite so i could have stayed at home for that. Scu made a good point that he thinks the English crop are ahead of the Irish if the Elliott horse can run 2nd in a grade one against their best when he was basically an also ran in England (albeit a winner). I got the point and think it makes sense. I'm going to do a proper write up re the Albert Bartlett tonight in a new thread where i'll detail what was said but it was only King's Palace and Captain Cutter that were touched on. The rest of that thread will be my thoughts but I think i have that race by the balls to be honest.
Preview tonight 7.30 Francombe, McGrath, McCoy [video=youtube;IOGs8dpQ_7Y]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOGs8dpQ_7Y[/video]
cant believe they advertised mccoy being on that, and that they managed to make cheltenham discussion boring
