Sorry if I'm stealing Toppy's idea here, and I'm not usually one to go overboard about a horse but having just watched the replay of the 1.10 at Plumpton I must say I was absolutely blown away by the performance of Invictus in what was a decent contest. The way he jumps his fences is to me very reminiscent of Master Minded at his brilliant best - he clears them by miles but doesn't balloon them, he jumps nimbly and accurately. The leap he put in at the fence at the top of the hill 2nd time round was simply stunning (although Simon Holt missed it he was too busy lookng at Gift Of Dgab).
I think it is significant that Alan King chose this race for Invictus as there is a 60 grand bonus if the winner can follow up by winning a chase at the Cheltenham Festival, a feat he has done previously with Voy Por Ustedes.
Invictus took 5 attempts to get off the mark over hurdles, finally winning over 2m 3.5f at Ascot after some pretty moderate efforts before that. He never seemed to hurdle with any sort of fluency, which makes his jumping of a fence seem even more impressive. After his game maiden hurdle win in April he was put away for the summer and made his chase debut mid-November at Hereford over 2m 5.5f on Gd/Gd-soft in places. Here he demonstrated already his impeccable jumping as he sailed over the obstacles and coasted home by 11 lengths from a modest field. But today he really stamped his authority over a decent field and he never touched a twig all way round. Today's race was over 2m4f on soft and he sailed over 14 fences as if they weren't there, some of his leaps were breathtaking. The time was slow by 15 seconds but one would expect that for an extended novice chase on slow ground. But the way he put the race to bed was quite awesome, despite some argy-bargy amongst his rivals on the final bend.
For all the exciting novice chasers we've seen this season (Peddlers Cross, Al Ferof, Grands Crus et al) this one looks the most exciting, stylish, flamboyant and just a pure natural and I would be interested in how far people think he could go? I don't see him in any of the Cheltenham lists at the moment but the Centenary or RSA would be within his scope I should think (the stable has Walkon for the Arkle).
Not quite the fantastic detailed write up that Toppy usually does but maybe this could be our next spotlight horse?
I think it is significant that Alan King chose this race for Invictus as there is a 60 grand bonus if the winner can follow up by winning a chase at the Cheltenham Festival, a feat he has done previously with Voy Por Ustedes.
Invictus took 5 attempts to get off the mark over hurdles, finally winning over 2m 3.5f at Ascot after some pretty moderate efforts before that. He never seemed to hurdle with any sort of fluency, which makes his jumping of a fence seem even more impressive. After his game maiden hurdle win in April he was put away for the summer and made his chase debut mid-November at Hereford over 2m 5.5f on Gd/Gd-soft in places. Here he demonstrated already his impeccable jumping as he sailed over the obstacles and coasted home by 11 lengths from a modest field. But today he really stamped his authority over a decent field and he never touched a twig all way round. Today's race was over 2m4f on soft and he sailed over 14 fences as if they weren't there, some of his leaps were breathtaking. The time was slow by 15 seconds but one would expect that for an extended novice chase on slow ground. But the way he put the race to bed was quite awesome, despite some argy-bargy amongst his rivals on the final bend.
For all the exciting novice chasers we've seen this season (Peddlers Cross, Al Ferof, Grands Crus et al) this one looks the most exciting, stylish, flamboyant and just a pure natural and I would be interested in how far people think he could go? I don't see him in any of the Cheltenham lists at the moment but the Centenary or RSA would be within his scope I should think (the stable has Walkon for the Arkle).
Not quite the fantastic detailed write up that Toppy usually does but maybe this could be our next spotlight horse?
