Jamie Lynch's Flat Season Preview: Look to the stars

With the Flat season upon us, Jamie Lynch hijacks one of the oldest - and phoniest - belief systems in the book, the signs of the zodiac, to analyse a dozen of the major racing personalities for 2013...

This novel that McCoy is supposed to be writing may turn out to be a hit given he has something in common with Kingsley Amis, Henry Fielding, Daphne du Maurier and William Shakespeare: they're all Taurus. It's written in the stars, you see, which is just as well as God only knows when he'll get the time to write it on earth. 

Then again, according to Astrology In Depth, Taureans hate discomfort, dislike hard work and are therefore inclined to seek occupations where they can hold back rather than risk themselves: being anything other than a jump jockey, in other words. When McCoy nearly won the Gold Cup aboard Sir des Champs it had nothing to do with horoscopes. Dirty scopes yes, but horoscopes no.

It's the Babylonians' fault. The race that gave us one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World - their Hanging Gardens - undid all that good work by also leaving the legacy of one of the Seven Biggest Red Herrings of the Modern World, courtesy of astrology. The other six, for what it's worth, are democracy, Feng Shui, the KitchenAid, multivitamins, the going stick and John Bishop.

I, and hopefully you, can't have astrology at any price, though I'm a Libra, hence a cynic by nature. The idea that our lives are governed by celestial forces out of this world is out of this world, almost as hard to stomach as the fact Russell Grant can and does charge £22.99 for a ten minutes on the phone. I know this as it says so on his website, but also because I rang up for a racing-related reading, to determine what the stars in the sky say about the stars on the level for the 2013 Flat season. 

ARIES (March 21 - April 19)
Case study - John Gosden (born March 30)

Russell says: The awards of last year hang heavy around your neck, but keeping a cool head, even under various gravitas-giving hats, is the hallmark of Aries. Remember how tall you are. You're looked up to by your peers, particularly in interviews. Keep talking the American talk. Focus on the spring equinox and the positive of the sun moving in rather than the spring clean and the negative of Nathaniel, Great Heavens, Izzi Top and Thought Worthy moving out. You still have the skill, you still have the fire and, most importantly, you still have The Fugue. 

TAURUS (April 20 - May 20)
Case study - Dawn Approach (born April 23)

Russell says: The bull. You're strong like one, you took none of it in 2012, and the bigger china shops are open for you this year. Once you're at full force there's no stopping you. However, yours is a fixed sign, meaning you can be slow to change, including gear, so beware those flat spots that could prevent high points. Similarly fixed are your targets, and you apparently won't go that extra mile-and-a-half, for the ultimate test at Epsom, though the people around you may want a new approach. 

GEMINI (May 21 - June 20)
Case study - Pearl Bloodstock (first ever runner June 2)

Russell says:  Think Gemini, think twins, and the twin virtues of intent and megabucks makes you an irresistable power in 2013. Wednesday is Gemini's luck day, though any day is a lucky day for those whose door you come-a-knocking with unrefusable offers. If you can't breed 'em, buy 'em. Look out Ballydoyle and Godolphin, there's a new superpower in town. Geminis go well with other Geminis, their compitability high and ambitions the same, so the link-up with Jamie Spencer (born June 8) is a match made in heaven, literally star-crossed lovers.  

CANCER (June 21 - July 22)
Case study - USA (Independence Day July 4)

Russell says: Just like the crab, American racing is going only sideways, if not backwards. That hard outer shell, used for protection, is in danger of acting as a buffer to the rest of the world. You've got a lot going for you, so look out rather than in, and have the courage of your convictions to see certain issues through. The racing world will be a better place with more of you in it, so be Wise (Dan), and let's see the Animal (Kingdom) in you. 

LEO (July 23 - August 22)
Case study - Black Caviar (born August 18)

Russell sings Simply Red, appropriately Stars: Anyone who ever saw you, would tell you the way I'm feeling. Anyone who ever took on you, would have to tell you that they're hurting inside. The only thing that left you daunted, was the feeling that you ain't Frankel. But he has gone while you are still about, turn up and win it, can't get beat. And I, see a name in the stars, it's you Black Caviar. I've seen you, at Ascot, I hope you come again. 

VIRGO (August 23 - September 22)
Case study - Ryan Moore (born September 18)

Russell says: Virgos, symbolised by the virgin, are often considered to be shy individuals, but that can sometimes mask the demon within, as is the case with you. You're hungry, probably literally and certainly metaphorically, and the time has come for you to regain your rightful place at the top of your profession. To get there you need only two things: more luck than in recent years, and a certain knighted Libran to start re-pulling his considerable weight. 

LIBRA (September 23 - October 22)
Case study - Aidan O'Brien (born October 16)

Russell says: Listen. Because Librans enjoy balance in their lives, they like to keep all options open, favouring discussions which tend to be more seated than heated. Librans have loads of speed. You, weighing up everything on the symbolic scales, are meticulous, but also far-sighted, even in dodgy sunglasses. Camelot's dimming star is balanced by the rising star of Kingsbarns, and amid all the pressure you, as an even-tempered Libran, keep your cool. You're Mr Cool. Mr Coolmore. 

SCORPIO (October 23 - November 21)
Case study - Channel 4 (first broadcast November 2)

Russell says: Like the scorpion, you're fiercly independent, which is a good job as you have the field to yourself now. Like the scorpion can lose its tail and promptly grow a new one, you too have tremendous regenerative powers, and this is a big year for you following the latest evolution. Like the scorpion would rather kill itself than be killed, you force the issues and have a style that some find overbearing, but mostly it's exciting and, with a bit of Luck and spot of Cunning, you'll revolutionise the way we watch racing. 

SAGITTARIUS (November 22 - December 21)
Case study - Graham Lee (born December 16)

Russell says:  The archer is depicted as a centaur, half man half beast, making Sagittarius a dual sign, and you are the ultimate dual jockey. You literally had your ups and downs over jumps, but the Flat is where it's at, and you, as an archer, are aiming higher and higher: well over 100 of your arrows will hit the bullseye this year. Influential is the North Star. In fact, you are the North Star. 

CAPRICORN (December 22 - January 19)
Case study - Marco Botti (born December 23)

Russell says:  Being born just one day into Capricorn puts you on the cusp, and you're on the cusp of the big time. Your symbol is the goat, who loves to climb to the top of the mountain, and you too are showing that same ambition, with a new base, new targets and new stars. One such star, Moohaajim, might just give a certain Taurean something to think about in a 

AQUARIUS (January 20 - February 18)
Case study - Frankie Dettori (born January 23)

Russell says: Who knows? Even horoscopes can't predict the unpredictable. Look at last year. Let's just hope you keep out of big bother and big brother this time. 

PISCES (February 19 - March 20)
Case study - Hydrogen (born March 12) 

Russell says: A water sign. H2-oh no. Rarely does the reality match the hype, even when the stars are aligned. It's all about the money, money, money, and it's not so easy to forget about the price tag when it's £2.5m, the most expensive yearling in the world last year. Who knows if you'll become a star, but the star-signs are there. 

You can read an interview with Marco Botti, as well as Jamie's definitive views on the classic ante-post markets and the jockeys' championship in Timeform Horses To Follow (2013 Flat season).

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Jamie Lynch's Cheltenham Day One Preview: Context is king

Our Chief Correspondent looks at day one of the Festival, in which he thinks punters have been twisting the big-race favourite's words and getting too attached to working-class heroes.

'Energy, razzmatazz and technical wizardry' was the testimonial blazoned across the posters and billboards. Who wouldn't want to have seen Sinatra At The London Palladium, a video presentation of the late singer's greatest recordings, staged in 2006, on the back of such an ardent endorsement? Only it wasn't.

The Observer reviewer's complete line, from which the promotional extract was craftily taken, was in actual fact: 'I couldn't help feeling that, for all the energy, razzmatazz and technical wizardry, the audience had been shortchanged.' I'm not sure whether Accentuate The Positive was part of the Sinatra posthumous setlist. 

Selective editing is the game and contextomy is its name, the dangerous art of quoting out of context, and it's rife, including in the highly-interpretive world of horse racing analysis. Besides painting a potentially misleading picture, 'quote mining' can also serve to contaminate subsequent interpretation of the original testament, and that's more or less the crux of it with Hurricane Fly, the horse around which the Champion Hurdle.

The critics who are unconvinced by Hurricane Fly tend to pull out one excerpt in particular: he didn't win the race last year when expected to. The 2012 Champion Hurdle, as evidence, is case closed as far as the prosecution is concerned, concluding that why now if not then, especially as, at the age of nine, two years older than the average winner, he must be looking down the hill if not quite over it? 

A persuasive enough argument, but based on an isolated incident, and last year's Champion Hurdle is out of context as well as out of character for Hurricane Fly.

His complete bio, from which the pejorative phrase was extracted and distortedly magnified, reads: Hurricane Fly, successful in 14 Grade 1 events including the 2011 Champion Hurdle, didn't win the race last year when expected to, but his odds of 4/6 that day reflected his superior standing over much the same horses he faces this time, and, unsurprisingly for a horse who's had half the racing of most nine-year-olds, there has been no sign of age catching up with him this season with three easy top-level wins from three starts.

Admittedly, this season's three wins do themselves need to be contextualised, as he's beaten nothing yet of the calibre he'll meet at Cheltenham, but the point is that, unlike in 2012, when he had just the one warm-up race amidst some doubts about his well-being, his preparation has gone smoothly, very smoothly, this time.

It's the nature of the racing game that interpretations fluctuate, individually and retrospectively, and, Hurricane Fly apart, there's been a certain amount of revisionism over the 2012 Champion Hurdle. Rock On Ruby, for example, whose win was, at the time, tinged with a touch of enterprise and opportunism, has suddenly become the unsung hero and reincarnation of Hardy Eustace, the back-to-back Champion Hurdler (2004/5) who was cut from the same uncompromising cloth, while everybody seems happy - and rightly so - to overlook Zarkandar's disappointment that day and accept that he's a different horse this different season. So why not Hurricane Fly? 

The enthusiastic Hurricane Fly, who settles better in his races these days and therefore isn't beholden to tactics as he once was, has never worn blinkers, but his knockers seemingly do, not seeing the wood for the one, solitary tree planted on Champion Hurdle day last year. 

Rock On Ruby and Zarkandar are solid, but solid has won fewer Champion Hurdles than a sharp turn of foot over the years, and Hurricane Fly has something else that, on his day, none of his rivals can match: a Timeform rating of 173, making him the best two-mile hurdler since the legendary Istabraq. It may come across as trite that I'm defending a horse who needs little or no defending - after all, he's clear favourite to take back his Champion Hurdle crown - but the purpose is merely to bring, or bring back, a bit of perspective to Hurricane Fly, bruised from a few cheap shots. 

The short-lived production Sinatra At The London Palladium reportedly built to a crescendo of Come Fly With Me, which is what I'm asking of you with Hurricane. This is my official quote on the matter: 'Will Hurricane Fly win? He can't get beat.' Putting it that way gives me some room for contextomy manoeuvre after the event. 
That's the Champion Hurdle spleen vented, but what about the other issues up for discussion on the first day of Cheltenham?

The Make-Or-Breaker

On the Tuesday it's a source of fun, on Wednesday it gets mildly annoying, by Thursday there's steam coming out of my ears, and on Friday I'm throwing stuff at the telly. We're talking the phoney-baloney "war", and reporting thereof, between bookies and punters. Bookies rep after bookies rep is wheeled out to tell us, the punters, whether we won that day or not, based on the horrific assumption that all punters back the same horse, always the favourites, and all bookies lay the same horses, always the favourites.

I can't wait for the boy Jiwani to inform that, despite having done £300 in cold blood on the first day according to my account, I'm actually on the winning team because four favourites went in. 

There is, however, a make-or-break horse on day one who will, realistically, decide a punters vs. bookies battle, if not the war. It will certainly shape the whole meeting let alone day for me, as I'm going in and going in big on My Tent Or Yours. Odds of 2.89/5 might not sound juicy, but as far as I'm concerned he's a 2.8 chance to post a higher rating than the Champion Hurdle winner. 

It's a straightforward case: you just don't get horses of My Tent Or Yours's proven ability running in novice hurdles. He's already bearing down on Golden Cygnet, winner of the 1978 Supreme, whose rating of 176 remains the highest for a novice hurdler in Timeform history, and to get in that bracket prior to the championship races of Cheltenham, as My Tent Or Yours has, is almost unheard of. 

Make sure you back him, if only to shout 'Damn right, you're damn right I'm a winner, Jiwani' during the inevitable update at 13:37 on Tuesday.

Match of the Day

There's another war brewing here, and it's something of a class war. In the blue (and yellow) corner, representing the working classes, from the North, we have Overturn, for whom phrases of hearts on sleeves and old-boots toughness were designed. And in the red (with white and navy bits) corner, representing the South, we have Simonsig, the private jet of thoroughbreds. 

My analytical head rules my proletariat, Hartlepool heart in this instance. Even the staunchest Overturn supporters can envisage Simonsig, full of running, looming upsides approaching two out. The closer to evens Simonsig gets, the more I'm likely to play up my Tent winnings. Toffs 1-0 Tradesmen. Punters 2-0 Bookies.

Tuesday's C.H.I.L.D. Must Be Replaced

Loving a second child as much as the first is a valid concern, or so I'm told, and that's the way I feel about Tuesday's second C.H.I.L.D. (Cheltenham Handicapper Imploring Large Down-payment) after my first, Attaglance, was withdrawn from the newly-named Rewards4Racing Handicap on account of the softening ground. In the same race, the child I now intend to sponsor heavily is The Druids Nephew, for whom the positive of his own form to some extent cancels out the negative of his stable form, The Druids Nephew its only winner of the season so far. So far...

The promise of his second at Ascot in November, where he split Hadrian's Approach and Rolling Star, was confirmed when he slammed Grandioso - successful twice and much improved subsequently - by 10 lengths at Wincanton. He ran above himself at the Cheltenham Festival last year when sixth in the Albert Bartlett, and The Druids Nephew will be, for one day only, my adopted child, before I abandon him for Attaglance when Aintree comes around.   

Read Jamie's Previews of days Two, Three and Four.

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Jamie Lynch's Cheltenham Day One Preview: Context is king

Our Chief Correspondent looks at day one of the Festival, in which he thinks punters have been twisting the big-race favourite's words and getting too attached to working-class heroes.

'Energy, razzmatazz and technical wizardry' was the testimonial blazoned across the posters and billboards. Who wouldn't want to have seen Sinatra At The London Palladium, a video presentation of the late singer's greatest recordings, staged in 2006, on the back of such an ardent endorsement? Only it wasn't.

The Observer reviewer's complete line, from which the promotional extract was craftily taken, was in actual fact: 'I couldn't help feeling that, for all the energy, razzmatazz and technical wizardry, the audience had been shortchanged.' I'm not sure whether Accentuate The Positive was part of the Sinatra posthumous setlist. 

Selective editing is the game and contextomy is its name, the dangerous art of quoting out of context, and it's rife, including in the highly-interpretive world of horse racing analysis. Besides painting a potentially misleading picture, 'quote mining' can also serve to contaminate subsequent interpretation of the original testament, and that's more or less the crux of it with Hurricane Fly, the horse around which the Champion Hurdle revolves.

The critics who are unconvinced by Hurricane Fly tend to pull out one excerpt in particular: he didn't win the race last year when expected to. The 2012 Champion Hurdle, as evidence, is case closed as far as the prosecution is concerned, concluding that why now if not then, especially as, at the age of nine, two years older than the average winner, he must be looking down the hill if not quite over it? 

A persuasive enough argument, but based on an isolated incident, and last year's Champion Hurdle is out of context as well as out of character for Hurricane Fly.

His complete bio, from which the pejorative phrase was extracted and distortedly magnified, reads: Hurricane Fly, successful in 14 Grade 1 events including the 2011 Champion Hurdle, didn't win the race last year when expected to, but his odds of 4/6 that day reflected his superior standing over much the same horses he faces this time, and, unsurprisingly for a horse who's had half the racing of most nine-year-olds, there has been no sign of age catching up with him this season with three easy top-level wins from three starts.

Admittedly, this season's three wins do themselves need to be contextualised, as he's beaten nothing yet of the calibre he'll meet at Cheltenham, but the point is that, unlike in 2012, when he had just the one warm-up race amidst some doubts about his well-being, his preparation has gone smoothly, very smoothly, this time.

It's the nature of the racing game that interpretations fluctuate, individually and retrospectively, and, Hurricane Fly apart, there's been a certain amount of revisionism over the 2012 Champion Hurdle. Rock On Ruby, for example, whose win was, at the time, tinged with a touch of enterprise and opportunism, has suddenly become the unsung hero and reincarnation of Hardy Eustace, the back-to-back Champion Hurdler (2004/5) who was cut from the same uncompromising cloth, while everybody seems happy - and rightly so - to overlook Zarkandar's disappointment that day and accept that he's a different horse this different season. So why not Hurricane Fly? 

The enthusiastic Hurricane Fly, who settles better in his races these days and therefore isn't beholden to tactics as he once was, has never worn blinkers, but his knockers seemingly do, not seeing the wood for the one, solitary tree planted on Champion Hurdle day last year. 

Rock On Ruby and Zarkandar are solid, but solid has won fewer Champion Hurdles than a sharp turn of foot over the years, and Hurricane Fly has something else that, on his day, none of his rivals can match: a Timeform rating of 173, making him the best two-mile hurdler since the legendary Istabraq. It may come across as trite that I'm defending a horse who needs little or no defending - after all, he's clear favourite to take back his Champion Hurdle crown - but the purpose is merely to bring, or bring back, a bit of perspective to Hurricane Fly, bruised from a few cheap shots. 

The short-lived production Sinatra At The London Palladium reportedly built to a crescendo of Come Fly With Me, which is what I'm asking of you with Hurricane. This is my official quote on the matter: 'Will Hurricane Fly win? He can't get beat.' Putting it that way gives me some room for contextomy manoeuvre after the event. 
That's the Champion Hurdle spleen vented, but what about the other issues up for discussion on the first day of Cheltenham?

The Make-Or-Breaker

On the Tuesday it's a source of fun, on Wednesday it gets mildly annoying, by Thursday there's steam coming out of my ears, and on Friday I'm throwing stuff at the telly. We're talking the phoney-baloney "war", and reporting thereof, between bookies and punters. Bookies rep after bookies rep is wheeled out to tell us, the punters, whether we won that day or not, based on the horrific assumption that all punters back the same horse, always the favourites, and all bookies lay the same horses, always the favourites.

I can't wait for the boy Jiwani to inform that, despite having done £300 in cold blood on the first day according to my account, I'm actually on the winning team because four favourites went in. 

There is, however, a make-or-break horse on day one who will, realistically, decide a punters vs. bookies battle, if not the war. It will certainly shape the whole meeting let alone day for me, as I'm going in and going in big on My Tent Or Yours. Odds of 2.89/5 might not sound juicy, but as far as I'm concerned he's a 2.8 chance to post a higher rating than the Champion Hurdle winner. 

It's a straightforward case: you just don't get horses of My Tent Or Yours's proven ability running in novice hurdles. He's already bearing down on Golden Cygnet, winner of the 1978 Supreme, whose rating of 176 remains the highest for a novice hurdler in Timeform history, and to get in that bracket prior to the championship races of Cheltenham, as My Tent Or Yours has, is almost unheard of. 

Make sure you back him, if only to shout 'Damn right, you're damn right I'm a winner, Jiwani' during the inevitable update at 13:37 on Tuesday.

Match of the Day

There's another war brewing here, and it's something of a class war. In the blue (and yellow) corner, representing the working classes, from the North, we have Overturn, for whom phrases of hearts on sleeves and old-boots toughness were designed. And in the red (with white and navy bits) corner, representing the South, we have Simonsig, the private jet of thoroughbreds. 

My analytical head rules my proletariat, Hartlepool heart in this instance. Even the staunchest Overturn supporters can envisage Simonsig, full of running, looming upsides approaching two out. The closer to evens Simonsig gets, the more I'm likely to play up my Tent winnings. Toffs 1-0 Tradesmen. Punters 2-0 Bookies.

Tuesday's C.H.I.L.D. Has Pull In Chase

C.H.I.L.D. Cheltenham Handicapper Imploring Large Downpayment. Malcolm Jefferson is preparing his lightning as we speak, having struck twice at the 2012 Festival last year with two horses who are back for more this year. Most eyes are on Cape Tribulation, who's going for Gold, but the other one, Attaglance, is the likelier to hit the mark again, in the recently renamed Rewards4Racing Novices' Handicap.

Having won the Martin Pipe off 139, then followed up at Aintree off 144, Attaglance gets in here with a mark of just 133, after a chasing campaign that smacks of saving up for Cheltenham. Pottering round in small-field novices, though jumping well, isn't what Attaglance is about, but taking that route has helped towards what's obviously a lenient mark compared to his hurdles form, and we could well see a different proposition in the last race on Tuesday.

Read Jamie's Previews of days Two, Three and Four.

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Jamie Lynch's Cheltenham Day Two Preview: Masterminding another Champion performance

Behind every great champion lies a well-run race, argues Jamie Lynch, as he tries to derive emotional, rather than financial, gain from this year's Champion Chase.

It happens infrequently, only five years in the last thirty to be exact, but every now and then the hare beats the tortoise on Timeform ratings, in that a two-mile chaser comes along who's so spectacular that it outranks the best in the staying division. Such speed-awareness horses are rarer still considering that those five supersonic years comprised just three chasers, as Badsworth Boy and Moscow Flyer did it in back-to-back seasons. Sprinter Sacre is about to become the fourth. 

Achieving a huge rating, as Badsworth Boy (179) and Moscow Flyer (184) did, along with Master Minded whose mighty 179 would have won him the outright rather than divisional award in almost any other era but Kauto Star's, can be as much about opportunity as ability. George Best had World Cup-winning ability but never the opportunity because of his compatriots. 

Likewise, to express their true talent, horses are sometimes at the mercy of comrades, but this specialist group - racing's adrenaline junkies - are reliant, above all, on pace, the faster the better. They feed on speed. That element has been the common denominator in each of the greatest displays in the Queen Mother Champion Chase over the last three decades. 

The gallop was strong when, in 1983, Badsworth Boy won, by a distance, the first of three consecutive renewals, while by far the better of Moscow Flyer's two Champion Chase wins, in 2005 when he finished clear with Well Chief of Azertyuiop, came courtesy of two outsiders following the Will.I.Am edict of going hard or going home.

It was the same scenario, only more pronounced, for Master Minded's show-stopper in 2008. A two-mile, undulating track incorporating 13 stiff, five-foot fences might not sound the ideal environment for an attempted land-speed record, but that's what Tamarinbleu and Schindlers Hunt did, and it proved the catalyst for one of the most memorable, as well as one of the highest-rated, performances in the history of the race, Master Minded storming away by 19 lengths.    
With that in mind, Nicky Henderson might as well go halves with Tom George on the £17,500 it cost to supplement Mail de Bievre for the Champion Chase, because his presence significantly increases the possibility of something out of this world from Sprinter Sacre. He has it in him, and the game is on, in a big way. 

Racing needs gambling and vice versa, but periodically, albeit fewer and further between than a two-miler who can outperform a Gold Cup winner, a thoroughbred emerges who uproots the whole sport from its entrenched betting foundations, so that the privilege comes in watching the horse rather than backing it, in the style of Frankel and Black Caviar. Sprinter Sacre is in the play-offs for that promotion, and a wingman like Mail de Bievre may give him a decisive leg-up. 

Is it better to be a wingman or a middleman? It sounds scurrilous to describe an Arkle and Champion Chase winner as a middleman, but that's what Sizing Europe might be reduced to by Sprinter Sacre, though he's the perfect link in the kingmaker chain. 

Visualise the composition. First the wingman, or wingmen if Sanctuaire reverts to type, provide the ideal platform by setting a searching gallop, before the all-important second stage, involving Sizing Europe. In his unbeaten time as a chaser, Sprinter Sacre has never played with a horse who can carry him deep enough into a race as Sizing Europe will. Then we'll see just how phenomenal Sprinter Sacre is. 

His current Timeform rating is 183p. He still has a little way to go to qualify for dressage, which is seemingly 191, the peak rating in Kauto Star's preliminary career as a racehorse, but, for Wednesday, the stage is set, the bit-part players are well-rehearsed, and we the audience are ready in anticipation of a seen-to-be-believed performance. Sprinter Sacre won't fluff his lines.

With odds of 1.282/7 and a sense of formality, the Champion Chase won't make us rich, but it may just leave us open mouthed in a way that Badsworth Boy did, that Moscow Flyer did, and that Master Minded did, the way that only crack two-mile chasers can. The blueprint has been mapped out for Sprinter Sacre to take his place in history, and for Mail de Bievre, Sanctuaire and Sizing Europe to be listed in the contributors.       
While the Champion Chase looks a race to savour first and bet in second if at all, the rest of the Wednesday Cheltenham card comprises races to bet in first and top up second, so let's look at a few:

The Make-Or-Breaker

This is personal rather than widespread make-or-breaker, but my biggest ante-post bet comes in the second race. Almost by the hour, the confidence levels from wager day to present day have diminished, firstly by the gradual revelation that Pont Alexandre is the second coming and then, more devastatingly, by the news that Dr Christian and his medical team have decamped to Grange Hill Farm hot on the trail of an equine scuppering bug. 

Sinatra permeated the Tuesday preview, and Mack is back in town for an explanatory singalong wittily entitled 'New One, New One'. (Let's forget about the word 'The' for now...)

Stop spreading the germs, I'm too late to lay
I want to see a big profit - New One, New One.
My savings bond dues, are going astray, 
Right through the very arse of it, Neptune, Neptune. 
I wanna wake up on the Thursday, and not to weep 
But to find I'm King of Cheltenham, cash in a heap.

And if I can make it there, I'll stroke Sam's ginger hair, 
It's up to you - New One, New One.  

Despite various shepherds and wise men with gifts gathering at a certain stable in Co. Carlow to proclaim the arrival of Pont Alexandre, and despite various vets and microbiologists in containment suits gathering at a certain stable in Naunton, I'm still a believer in The New One. I have to be. 

Amid the panic (sorry, my panic), let's not forget that The New One beat My Tent Or Yours in the Graded bumper at Aintree and that he could and probably should be undefeated over hurdles, but for Sam Twiston-Davies pressing on marginally too soon on testing ground at Cheltenham last time. 

Pont Alexandre looks a top horse, and he is one by the sounds of it, but he'll have to be to see off the classy and hardened The New One. 

Wednesday's C.H.I.L.D. Is Ex-Sheikh Mo

If The New One does shake off the twin troubles of the lurgi and the next Denman, then I promise to donate a portion of my winnings to Greatwood, a fantastic charity that provides fullilling futures for former racehorses. Equally productive, but less reliant upon benefaction, is a similar set-up by the name of Bloomfields, which gives regally-bred Flat horses a second chance as jumpers, and, under the management of John Ferguson, it's proving a huge success. 

Bloomfields is the source of Wednesday's C.H.I.L.D. (Cheltenham Handicapper Imploring Large Down-payment), as Bordoni looks the ideal type, and favorably treated, for the Fred Winter. Impeccably bred, by Bernardini and from the family of Allez France, Bordoni went the right way in his only season on the Flat and has taken well to hurdling... apart from that time he ran out when set to hack up at Ludlow. But he put that behind him when making short work of subsequent-winner Somemothersdohavem at Market Rasen, when looking for all the world as if the demands of a well-run race on a stiff track like Cheltenham will be the making of him, as supported by the fact he won at as far as two miles on the Flat. 

Career-changer Bordoni was bred for Epsom rather than Cheltenham, but better Cheltenham than Greatwood, or dressage for that matter.  

Read Jamie's Previews of days One, Three and Four.

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Jamie Lynch's Cheltenham Day Three Preview: Staying ain't what it used to be

"What's especially pertinent about flagging up the discrepant demands of the old and new ahead of this year's World Hurdle is that stamina is the pivotal issue regards the pivotal player."

The World Hurdle mightn't be a wholly accurate name for the day-three feature, but it's arguably better than one that gives unwarranted heart to plodders, argues Jamie Lynch as he tries to make a case for third-time-lucky over three miles of the New Course.

There's a school of thought that the World Series, the annual Baseball championship that's global in name but exclusively North American in practice, gets its title not from any mild pomposity but from the newspaper that first sponsored it, the New York World. 

It's a blow to those who snipe and say that only in America could there be such blind arrogance as to take a sporting contest that's so conspicuously municipal, never leaving its shores, and label it as a 'World' event. On an unrelated matter, the big race of the day at Cheltenham is the World Hurdle, though only since 2005 has it had such a grandiose title. 

A name change sometimes does more harm than good. In the 'nineties, when Kellogg's dared to mess with Coco Pops, in the scandalous misbelief that what we actually wanted was Choco Krispies, so fierce was the public backlash that within a year, tail firmly between legs, order had been restored. In the racing industry, where renaming of races is epidemic, even at the major festivals,  there was little more than the shrugging of shoulders and rolling of eyes when it was announced in 2005 that, as part of a new sponsorship deal, the Stayers' Hurdle, which did exactly what it said on the tin since 1972, would henceforth be the World Hurdle. More shiny, less relevant. 

However, there's evidence to suggest the race was in fact overdue a name change and that the 'Stayers' tag was something of a misnomer, at least compared to the original design. Prior to 1993, the race was run on the Old Course over a distance of three miles and a furlong. The last winner under those conditions, in what is widely considered to be one of the strongest ever renewals, was Nomadic Way, who clocked a time of 6:33.93, on good ground.

Since its switch to later in the week on the New Course, the average winning time in the Stayers' Hurdle, using the 14 of the 19 runnings when the going was good, is 5:47.23. That's significantly less staying to be done, equivalent to over three furlongs. 

Wholesale remeasurements undertaken by Cheltenham after the 1999 Festival did see an official reduction in the Stayers' Hurdle distance by half a furlong to a flat three miles, but there's more to it than that, and it seems that 'declinism' - the idea that things ain't what they used to be - applies to championship races at Cheltenham and not just to meat, Arsenal and Quality Street - both the tin and the sweets.

What's especially pertinent about flagging up the discrepant demands of the old and new ahead of this year's World Hurdle is that stamina is the pivotal issue regards the pivotal player. The universal acceptance that Oscar Whisky is the best horse in the World Hurdle is qualified by his doubted staying power, but, as highlighted, staying isn't necessarily the name of the game, or the race, anymore.

It can't, though, be brushed under the carpet that Oscar Whisky is working on the premise of if at first - or second - you don't succeed, try, try again, because he's already had two tries over the World Hurdle course and distance, but with mitigation both times. In last year's World Hurdle, he paid a heavy price for trying to match the unmatchable Big Buck's from a fair way out, and then in this season's Cleeve Hurdle, the major trial, Oscar Whisky was much more convincing, beaten only a neck by Reve de Sivola when the ground was heavy and the ride was more exploratory than excavatory. 

If we were in the 1980s, the halcyon days of unprocessed meat, a reliable Arsenal, quality Quality Street and a stamina-sapping Stayers' Hurdle, then Oscar Whisky wouldn't have a prayer against the relentless Reve de Sivola, but we're in the age of fast food, fast connections and faster times in the 'staying' championship, and Oscar Whisky can make his class count.

Every Which RSA But Jewson

Dynaste is only one letter away from Dynasty, a soap opera that specialised in cliffhangers and regularly held its followers in suspense. When I attended the David Pipe media day two weeks ago, I thought he was just playing the game when he suggested that he didn't know whether Dynaste would run in the RSA or the Jewson, but it turns out he wasn't, and still doesn't, looking at the Betfair markets for both races. 

If the ghost of Grands Crus still hasn't been exorcised by next week and Dynaste swerves the RSA for the first race on Thursday then it's a win-lose situation for me: Dynaste wins and my ante-post bet on Aupcharlie loses. It's as simple as that.
The Make-Or-Breaker

While the Dynaste missile is yet to receive exact coordinates, the Ballynagour bomb looks to be locked onto the Byrne Group Plate. The fifth race on the third day is deep enough into the Festival for Ballynagour to be a "sod it" bet, or a "(worse word than sod) it" bet, by which I mean some people will just go 'all in' with what's left of their Cheltenham bank, myself possibly included. In that eventuality, we'll all be sitting tight, including Tom Scu hopefully.

Thursday's C.H.I.L.D. Is Old And Slow

Old, slow and exposed aren't usually the qualities you look for in a handicapper for Cheltenham, but the Pertemps Final is different, and Junior fits the bill very nicely. Six of the last 14 Pertemps winners have been aged nine or older, while three have been returning to hurdling after a spell chasing, and Junior qualifies on both counts. Previous Festival form also seems an advantage, and Junior scores highly in that regard, having won the Kim Muir in 2011 and finished third in the Coral Cup three years earlier. 

Two runs since a winning reappearance this season have been in races he literally had no chance, but safeguarding his handicap mark for hurdles, and the ironically-named Junior might just show the youngsters a thing or two in a race the Pipes have won three times, including twice with the old, slow and exposed Buena Vista.

Read Jamie's Previews of days One, Two and Four.

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Jamie Lynch's Cheltenham Day Four Preview: A cheeky word of motivation

In Jamie Lynch's preview of the final day of Cheltenham, the focus is on focus, and whether a leading Gold Cup contender can take inspiration and motivation from a sporting Knight of the Realm.

'I had no motivation to do anything.' It's not uncommon for athletes to lose their mojo, but it is for them to recapture and multiply it in the way Sir Bradley Wiggins has. It was after the 2004 Olympics in Athens, where he won a gold, silver and bronze, that his get up and go got up and went, by his own admission: 'I had lost a big thing in my life. Something that had driven me for so long was gone...I'd lived so religiously in the run-up to Athens.'

Lulls are both relative and indefinite, but Wiggins' dip was low and long, until a new-found focus put him on a road to stardom for which the stop-offs included Beijing for more golds in 2008, the Champs-Elysees, London 2012 and, ultimately, Buckingham Palace. Something propelled him. Perhaps it was those sideburns.

Sideburns of a slightly different kind are the pinned-on hopes of propulsion for Long Run in the Gold Cup. Any parallels go only so far, of course, because Long Run is more like Wiggins' bike in the sense that he feels no pressure nor expectation, while Sam Waley-Cohen, by popular consent, isn't in the same league as Wiggins as a rider. No animal behaviourist has proved or disproved that horses have emotions, but they do, like humans, have identifiable and changeable characteristics, including motivation, and, to a lesser extent, albeit for some time now, Long Run has seemed to be suffering the same malaise Wiggins did of an extinguished fire in the belly.

It's almost recognition of his lassitude that connections are now reaching for the sideburns, or cheekpieces as they are, equipment designed to (re)stimulate and (re)focus the horse. Whether they'll work is the £313,225 question, but first-time headgear did the trick of reinvigorating See More Business in the 1999 Gold Cup. What are the chances of cheekpieces sparking Long Run into 'doing a Wiggins' and taking off again?

This is the point at which, as the final piece of the puzzle, having crunched the numbers, I tell you that, statistically speaking, cheekpieces impact positively upon performance. Only they don't, no more than by chance, anyway. In fact, analysing all 983 cases in Britain and Ireland of jumpers wearing first-time cheekpieces in 2012, wins (77) were fewer than random probability and, measuring by Timeform ratings where available, the sideburned horses collectively performed slightly below expectation (by 3.7 lb), even allowing for them starting at longer-than-average prices.

However, in a lot of those cases, also in part explaining the higher SP anomaly, the horses were put in cheekpieces as a last ability-finding resort, looking for something uncertain to be there, and often not there, but we know it's there with Long Run. That's exactly why, for him more than many, this experiment might just work: the cheekpieces are digging for gold where gold has been won before.

Even in winning at Kempton in December, on heavy ground, Long Run looked slow, but there's a faster horse in there somewhere, the one who, as a zealous six-year-old, had the King George and Gold Cup in the bag a long way out, the latter in the course record time.

Think of the Long Run/cheekpieces relationship the other way round, at the needs of cheekpieces rather than Long Run. For cheekpieces to best do their duty of giving a horse that missing edge, they need something to tap into, either a higher past rating or, better still, some lost speed, and in that respect Long Run is the perfect prototype.

Of the main rivals, Sir des Champs is himself a candidate for headgear one day, though for now he has a proven motivational tool to help, namely Cheltenham, having won at the previous two Festivals, while neither Bobs Worth nor Silviniaco Conti are in need of any trigger, too young and too hungry for all that, though in form terms both still have to look up to see where Long Run used to be.

Used to be is the operative phrase, and the cheekpieces may prove academic if, as is totally reasonable, such is nature's way, age has caught up and Long Run has slowed down, but there's a chance - just a chance - that he's been pulling the wool over our eyes, to be exposed by the wool on the sides of his face.

The races subsequent to the Gold Cup inevitably have an air of 'after the Lord Mayor's show' about them, though sometimes it can be worth waiting around, like after the show at which Coventry's former Lord Mayor got drunk and, while wearing the ceremonial gold chains, told various women what he'd enjoy doing to them...

REMATCH OF THE DAY
It's billed as the amateurs' Gold Cup, but there was nothing amateurish about Colm Sweeney and Jack Barber in the Foxhunter, who produced rides that Walsh and Geraghty would be proud. There was only a length between Salsify and Chapoturgeon at the line, and the rematch is on, the sequel as much about the jockeys again, as the horses are exactly the same this year as last judged on their recent wins.

Are there any lessons to be learned from twelve months ago? Yes, because I backed Chapoturgeon, and I know for a fact that if he couldn't beat Salisify then under the ballsiest of ballsy rides by Barber, he won't do now. Sweeney God to beat the demon Barber.

FRIDAY'S C.H.I.L.D. KEEPS COMING AND WINNING
Drumshambo 2, Anay Turge 1, Bendant 1, Rouge Et Blanc 2, Jumps Road 2, The Chazer 1, Kapga de Cerisy 2, Eastlake 1. Those are the names and number of subsequent wins of the horses who Rody has faced in just three starts this season. Strong form to say the least, suggesting that Nicky Henderson won't have it all his own way in the Grand Annual.

OUR CONOR
Not a reference to the Triumph (won by Rolling Star), but an homage to and attempted impression of Conor Murphy, the punters' hero. So here goes with my accumulated Festival Five who'll alow me to likewise relocate to America and set up as a trainer:

My Tent Or Yours, Supreme
The New One, Neptune
Bordoni, Fred Winter
Oscar Whisky, World Hurdle
Salsify, Foxhunter

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Jamie Lynch's Cheltenham Day One Preview: Context is king

Our Chief Correspondent looks at day one of the Festival, in which he thinks punters have been twisting the big-race favourite's words and getting too attached to working-class heroes.

'Energy, razzmatazz and technical wizardry' was the testimonial blazoned across the posters and billboards. Who wouldn't want to have seen Sinatra At The London Palladium, a video presentation of the late singer's greatest recordings, staged in 2006, on the back of such an ardent endorsement? Only it wasn't.

The Observer reviewer's complete line, from which the promotional extract was craftily taken, was in actual fact: 'I couldn't help feeling that, for all the energy, razzmatazz and technical wizardry, the audience had been shortchanged.' I'm not sure whether Accentuate The Positive was part of the Sinatra posthumous setlist. 

Selective editing is the game and contextomy is its name, the dangerous art of quoting out of context, and it's rife, including in the highly-interpretive world of horse racing analysis. Besides painting a potentially misleading picture, 'quote mining' can also serve to contaminate subsequent interpretation of the original testament, and that's more or less the crux of it with Hurricane Fly, the horse around which the Champion Hurdle revolves.

The critics who are unconvinced by Hurricane Fly tend to pull out one excerpt in particular: he didn't win the race last year when expected to. The 2012 Champion Hurdle, as evidence, is case closed as far as the prosecution is concerned, concluding that why now if not then, especially as, at the age of nine, two years older than the average winner, he must be looking down the hill if not quite over it? 

A persuasive enough argument, but based on an isolated incident, and last year's Champion Hurdle is out of context as well as out of character for Hurricane Fly.

His complete bio, from which the pejorative phrase was extracted and distortedly magnified, reads: Hurricane Fly, successful in 14 Grade 1 events including the 2011 Champion Hurdle, didn't win the race last year when expected to, but his odds of 4/6 that day reflected his superior standing over much the same horses he faces this time, and, unsurprisingly for a horse who's had half the racing of most nine-year-olds, there has been no sign of age catching up with him this season with three easy top-level wins from three starts.

Admittedly, this season's three wins do themselves need to be contextualised, as he's beaten nothing yet of the calibre he'll meet at Cheltenham, but the point is that, unlike in 2012, when he had just the one warm-up race amidst some doubts about his well-being, his preparation has gone smoothly, very smoothly, this time.

It's the nature of the racing game that interpretations fluctuate, individually and retrospectively, and, Hurricane Fly apart, there's been a certain amount of revisionism over the 2012 Champion Hurdle. Rock On Ruby, for example, whose win was, at the time, tinged with a touch of enterprise and opportunism, has suddenly become the unsung hero and reincarnation of Hardy Eustace, the back-to-back Champion Hurdler (2004/5) who was cut from the same uncompromising cloth, while everybody seems happy - and rightly so - to overlook Zarkandar's disappointment that day and accept that he's a different horse this different season. So why not Hurricane Fly? 

The enthusiastic Hurricane Fly, who settles better in his races these days and therefore isn't beholden to tactics as he once was, has never worn blinkers, but his knockers seemingly do, not seeing the wood for the one, solitary tree planted on Champion Hurdle day last year. 

Rock On Ruby and Zarkandar are solid, but solid has won fewer Champion Hurdles than a sharp turn of foot over the years, and Hurricane Fly has something else that, on his day, none of his rivals can match: a Timeform rating of 173, making him the best two-mile hurdler since the legendary Istabraq. It may come across as trite that I'm defending a horse who needs little or no defending - after all, he's clear favourite to take back his Champion Hurdle crown - but the purpose is merely to bring, or bring back, a bit of perspective to Hurricane Fly, bruised from a few cheap shots. 

The short-lived production Sinatra At The London Palladium reportedly built to a crescendo of Come Fly With Me, which is what I'm asking of you with Hurricane. This is my official quote on the matter: 'Will Hurricane Fly win? He can't get beat.' Putting it that way gives me some room for contextomy manoeuvre after the event. 
That's the Champion Hurdle spleen vented, but what about the other issues up for discussion on the first day of Cheltenham?

The Make-Or-Breaker

On the Tuesday it's a source of fun, on Wednesday it gets mildly annoying, by Thursday there's steam coming out of my ears, and on Friday I'm throwing stuff at the telly. We're talking the phoney-baloney "war", and reporting thereof, between bookies and punters. Bookies rep after bookies rep is wheeled out to tell us, the punters, whether we won that day or not, based on the horrific assumption that all punters back the same horse, always the favourites, and all bookies lay the same horses, always the favourites.

I can't wait for the boy Jiwani to inform that, despite having done £300 in cold blood on the first day according to my account, I'm actually on the winning team because four favourites went in. 

There is, however, a make-or-break horse on day one who will, realistically, decide a punters vs. bookies battle, if not the war. It will certainly shape the whole meeting let alone day for me, as I'm going in and going in big on My Tent Or Yours. Odds of 2.89/5 might not sound juicy, but as far as I'm concerned he's a 2.8 chance to post a higher rating than the Champion Hurdle winner. 

It's a straightforward case: you just don't get horses of My Tent Or Yours's proven ability running in novice hurdles. He's already bearing down on Golden Cygnet, winner of the 1978 Supreme, whose rating of 176 remains the highest for a novice hurdler in Timeform history, and to get in that bracket prior to the championship races of Cheltenham, as My Tent Or Yours has, is almost unheard of. 

Make sure you back him, if only to shout 'Damn right, you're damn right I'm a winner, Jiwani' during the inevitable update at 13:37 on Tuesday.

Match of the Day

There's another war brewing here, and it's something of a class war. In the blue (and yellow) corner, representing the working classes, from the North, we have Overturn, for whom phrases of hearts on sleeves and old-boots toughness were designed. And in the red (with white and navy bits) corner, representing the South, we have Simonsig, the private jet of thoroughbreds. 

My analytical head rules my proletariat, Hartlepool heart in this instance. Even the staunchest Overturn supporters can envisage Simonsig, full of running, looming upsides approaching two out. The closer to evens Simonsig gets, the more I'm likely to play up my Tent winnings. Toffs 1-0 Tradesmen. Punters 2-0 Bookies.

Tuesday's C.H.I.L.D. Has Pull In Chase

C.H.I.L.D. Cheltenham Handicapper Imploring Large Downpayment. Malcolm Jefferson is preparing his lightning as we speak, having struck twice at the 2012 Festival last year with two horses who are back for more this year. Most eyes are on Cape Tribulation, who's going for Gold, but the other one, Attaglance, is the likelier to hit the mark again, in the recently renamed Rewards4Racing Novices' Handicap.

Having won the Martin Pipe off 139, then followed up at Aintree off 144, Attaglance gets in here with a mark of just 133, after a chasing campaign that smacks of saving up for Cheltenham. Pottering round in small-field novices, though jumping well, isn't what Attaglance is about, but taking that route has helped towards what's obviously a lenient mark compared to his hurdles form, and we could well see a different proposition in the last race on Tuesday.

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