All’s possible before the Cheltenham Festival begins but the smart money will be on Majborough providing a distillation of what may be to come this week in the Arkle Trophy.
Trained by Willie Mullins and owned by JP McManus, the French bred represents the two most successful figures in Cheltenham history, both of whom have rarely if ever started the festival with more ammunition to fire.
Mullins starts the week on the scarcely believable tally of 103 festival winners. He is all but unbackable to be crowned leading trainer again for a 12th time, maybe even exceeding his 2022 record haul of 10 winners in a single week.
At the end of the week lies the prospect of a Gold Cup hat-trick for his top star Galopin Des Champs. One of the main threats to “Galopin” may be Inothewayurthinkin, part of a mammoth cross-channel festival squad carrying McManus’s famed green and yellow silks.
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McManus has had 78 festival winners in over 40 years. There were seven in 2020 alone. Even by his standards though he starts the week with a squad of likely favourites that has bookmakers twitching at what the man famed for his love of a bet might pull off.
So, the significance of how he combines with Mullins for the first major hotpot over fences this week won’t be lost on anyone. The two Irishmen have redefined what festival success looks like. Together they shape as being unstoppable in this Arkle.
That Majborough is one of a quartet of heavy favourites in Tuesday’s Grade One races will have accumulator punters purring in anticipation but also reheat old arguments about diluted competition during racing’s biggest week of the year.
How attractive a proposition it is for so many “shorties” to be in so few hands is debatable. What isn’t is how the Jockey Club that owns Cheltenham has already admitted attendance levels will be down this year.
The first flush of post-pandemic enthusiasm that saw over 280,000 attend the 2022 festival has weakened like a struggling outsider. Last year saw a figure of just short of 230,000 returned. The Jockey Club’s bar this time is set at over 200,000.
For what is the uncontested jewel in National Hunt racing’s crown it is a worrying trend that a series of tweaks to various race conditions has clearly done nothing to reverse.
Jockey Club hubris that not so long ago had them floating the idea of a five-day festival has been replaced by reluctant acceptance that less really can be more, although not yet to the extent of switching back to a traditional three-day meeting.
Desperately painful perspective is put on such matters though in the very first race. The opening Supreme Novices Hurdle remembers the late Michael O’Sullivan, who died just weeks ago due to fatal injuries sustained in a fall at Thurles. Winner of the Supreme in 2023 on board Marine Nationale, the Cork rider doubled up on this day two years ago on Jazzy Matty.
It is a grim but appropriate memorial to a 24-year-old jockey who experienced more than most the buzz of anticipation that comes with the first race of the festival at 1.20pm.
Perhaps even more poignant is how O’Sullivan would probably have been part of the Willie Mullins Supreme team. Paul Townend is on hot favourite Kopes Des Bordes as Mullins saddles half the dozen runners. On the back of his spectacular display at the Dublin Racing Festival “Kopek” will set the tone for the week for many punters, although they might be as nervous beforehand as during the race.
The potential for the Irish hotpot to boil over and ruin his chance before 1.20pm is reflected in the application of a first-time hood, designed to drown out the noise and atmosphere from the most raucous environment of the year. If it works the rest may be inevitable.
If the Champion Hurdle is Tuesday’s centre-piece there will be almost as much interest in the reception Lossiemouth might get if she wins the Close Bros Mares Hurdle.
Those convinced she should be lining up in the main event rather than defending her Mares title might make their feelings known through silence – or not.
It might prove moot. If Lossiemouth wasn’t giving good enough signals to line up in the Champion the argument will be she might be vulnerable here too despite her clear edge on official ratings. Henry De Bromhead’s July Flower could be the one to exploit any weaknesses in the favourite.
The three handicaps up for grabs are intensely competitive, and Haiti Coeleurs looks worth examining in the marathon National Hunt Chase. The race is now open to professional riders. Unlucky not to be unbeaten over fences at the tracks, Rebecca Curtis’ runner warmed up for this task with a nice spin over hurdles last month.
There are four McManus runners in the juvenile handicap hurdle and on likely decent ground Mark Walsh may be on the best of them in Puturhandstogether.
Cheltenham predictions: 1.20- Kopek Des Bordes 2.00- Majborough 2.40- Broadway Boy 3.20- July Flower 4.00- Constitution Hill 4.40- Puturhandstogether 5.10- Haiti Couleurs (Nap)
Nap and Double- Haiti Couleurs & July Flower
