by Cheltenham Festival Tuesday is the most anticipated day in the jump racing calendar, with months of preparation and speculation finally coming to fruition.
The big race of the day, the Champion Hurdle, has lost a major entry to last year’s winner Constitution Hill, but there are still plenty of stars ready to light up the opening day of the meeting.
When is the first day of the Cheltenham Festival?
The meeting will begin today, Tuesday, March 12. The first of seven races is off at 1.30pm. Scroll down for full schedule.
How can I watch the Cheltenham Festival?
The first five races of each day of the meeting will be broadcast live free-to-air on ITV1 and streamed via ITVX. For coverage of the entire card, including the final two races of each day, Racing TV is the place to go.
What races are on the first day of the Cheltenham Festival?
1. 30: Sky Bet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle (Grade 1)
Marlborough Tip: Mystical power
2.10: Arkle’s Quest for a New Beginning Challenge Trophy (Grade 1)
Marlborough Tip: Multi Estate Temps
2.50: Ultima Handicap Chase (Premier Handicap)
Marlborough Tip: Stumbtown
3.30: Unibet Champion Hurdle Challenge Trophy (Grade 1)
Marlborough Tip: Statesman
4.10: Hurdle Mares Brothers Close (Grade 1)
Marlborough Tip: Lossiemouth
4.50: Boodles Youth Handicap Program (Primary Caspian)
Marlborough Tip: Batman Girac
5.30: Jockeys’ Cup National Challenge Chase ‘Novices’ Chase (Grade 2)
Marlborough Tip: Corbetts Cross
Cheltenham Festival 1 tips
Marcus Armytage’s best bet
Mr Vango (National Hunt Chase, 5.30): He won the Devon National by 60 lengths on his last start, the ride is sure to stay. Any chinks in the stamina of the good Irish horses, he will find them out. His trainer died last week – it’s written in the stars.
Charlie Brooks’ best bet
Mr Vango (National Hunt Chase, 5.30): Mr. Vango is the best value today. The eight-year-old gelding was the last winner to receive official training from Gold Cup-winning trainer Mark Bradstock before he died last week. He went all home on heavy ground at Exeter a couple of weeks ago, soupon Over. Mr. Vango is a classic Bradstock horse. Not over-raced, and punched well above its weight.
Telegraph Sport’s best bet
Cruach Slade (Upper New People’s Crest, 1.30): The opening two races of the meeting are wide open and are attracting punting bids with big names in one of the two underperforming markets. Gaelic Warrior wins the Arkle but Slade Steel has a tasty price for the opening race of the meeting – the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle.
He has only been beaten twice under rules, on both occasions at Ballyburn – the favorite in the Gallagher Novices’ Hurdle on Wednesday. He was seven lengths behind Lepertown at Lepertown last month and that may be good enough to win this race, with questions for others to answer.
At around 7/1, he’s a great all-way bet to start the meeting.
What is the weather forecast?
There may be a few showers on the opening day of the meeting but these should be light and sporadic. The temperature will get up to a maximum of 12C.
The going on the Old Course (which is the circuit used on the first day) is rated as soft.
Mr. Vango would be a fitting winner, with a little help from divine intervention
By Marcus Armytage
Few sports are as fateful or fairytale-like as horse racing and on top of all those things that can be analyzed such as the horse’s form, rating and desires in relation to certain conditions and courses, there is something that cannot be consider in the same way; It is regularly an accessible force in the outcome of races – if, indeed, that is what is involved.
While Willie Mullins will be keen to win the National Hunting Championship on Tuesday which is held in memory of family matriarch Maureen Mullins, who died in February, there will be no more prolific winners on the first day of this year’s Festival . nor Mr Vango if he had won a day before the private funeral of his trainer Mark Bradstock. Is it written in the stars?
Together with his wife Sara, the central half of the partnership, Bradstock, 66, had no more than a dozen horses in the yard but there was no lack of a good one whether it was his first Festival winner, King Harald, the Hennessy Carruthers winner, who . brother to 2015 Gold Cup winner Coneygree, Bet365 Gold Cup winner Step Back and, possibly now, Mr Vango.
It is what you would expect from a patiently bred Bradstock horse. He was ‘pinched’ under the noses of many more trainers for £30,000 after winning a British 25-furlong point-to-point two years ago and, on his last start, provided his last winner and a winner for the sick trainer. a tonic that no oncologist could match; coming home 60 lengths clear in the Devon National at Exeter.
You can take the view, like the bookies, that the Exeter race fell apart or you can take the opposite view that it was the long distance chaser running relentlessly.
The first and second places in the betting, Mullins Cross Corbetts and Embassy Gardens pair, have both been fitted with hoods for the first time, a growing trend for Closutton runners, suggesting they may both need to change from their get the three-and-three-quarter mile. on Tuesday. As Mr. Vango tests his stamina they will have to wait everywhere.
The latest example of an otherworldly result came when Highland Hunter, the favorite horse of wicked point-to-point jockey Keagan Kirkby, won at Newbury just days before leading the jockey’s funeral procession in the west. He goes in the Ultima Handicap Chase but with a 5lb penalty for that win, he will need a lot of help from above and a bit too much time from Kirkby.
If, however, it is absent friends that we are talking about then we have to mention Constitution Hill, already adorning the poster advertising next year’s Festival just after the job won, which is sorry for defending her Unibet Champion Hurdle title on a sick note.
Will all the action be poorer without the best jersey in the world? Of course, to a point, but I doubt any tickets for Tuesday have been returned for refunds because of it and when the winner’s name goes up on the honors list – probably last year’s runner-up State Man – it might history will record the horses he won. but it will not list the horses that did not turn up.
The timing of what we would call a chest infection is unlucky but his trainer Nicky Henderson is the man with the best record in the Champion Hurdle and with an afterthought entry, Iberico Lord could still win it for a 10th time .
Like Constitution Hill and, on Monday, Cleeve Hill, the backdrop of the entertainment four days later, his horses have been buried under a cloud but for the moment at least, we have to accept trust that they would not be here if they were. neither the trainer nor his vets thought they were in good shape.
This race may be suitable for rapidly improving six-year-olds making the step up from handicap to champion. He would not be the first horse to win the Betfair Hurdle en route to winning the Champion Hurdle.
The main talking point this week is the dominance of the Irish or, more specifically, one Irishman, Willie Mullins. It makes quite a half of your favorites.
If you’re looking for omens ahead, I suggest you take Oscar Cillian Murphy ahead of Ireland’s capitalization of England at Twickenham on Saturday. Britain will be winless but it’s hard to see the home side lifting the Prestbury Cup this year or, indeed, anytime soon in the cycle of these things.
Mullins has odds with two bettors of 10 winners (his record in 2022) or more, he is 16-1 to have five or fewer. Six is plenty for him and, currently on 94, six this year would make him the first man to have a century of winners at the Féile. We’ll give you that Willie but, this year, don’t go and win your mother’s race.
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