Cheltenham Gossip....

 

The Festival is almost upon us and the rumours are flying thick and fast! Starting today, I will be relaying any  gossip I hear about the chances of the main players:

There have been some raised eyebrows in the last couple of days over the perceived drift in price of Long Run for the Gold Cup (6/4 out to 2/1 on Betfair). Seven barrows have denied that there is a problem with the horse and my contact at the stable has told me there is nothing amiss. If the drift continues, I may be tempted into backing him - 5/2 would be my minimum target price. (My main bet of the race is each way on Midnight Chase which I got at 16/1. I still think he's overpriced at 12's if anyone fancies following me in)

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I've also been hearing a few noises from the King stable. Here are the little pieces of gossip I have managed to sniff out:

Invictus - has had a few problems in recent days so factor that into any bets you may be having. Not sure how serious the problems have been but there are problems nonetheless.

Grumeti - Not really gossip this as everybody knows but I will repeat it again anyway. Grumeti was lame yesterday after spreading a plate and getting the clip in his foot. They think he will be fine so long as there is no infection.

Vendor -  Strongly fancied for the Fred Winter. The fancy prices are long gone unfortunately but 7/2 looks a reasonable price to me considering Mr King thinks this one is as good as Grumeti who's rated 15lbs higher.

Montbazon - In cracking form at home and has a very good each way chance in the Supreme Novices hurdle

Bless the Wings - Another one that is really fancied - a big each way chance were the exact words I heard. Working really well and ready to run his race.

Hold on Julio - this one has had a few problems since his last run and may need to be treated with caution.

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That's all the gossip for now.

Over the next three posts,  I'll be letting you in on the bets that I percieve to be the best value in the feature races of each day at the festival (you've already heard that my big each way fancy for the gold cup is Midnight Chase). Today |I'm looking at the Champion Hurdle, the big race on the opening day.

Champion Hurdle

Clearly it's very difficult to see past Hurricane Fly. If he runs his race, he wins - there is very little doubt of that. However, I don't feel there is any value playing him at odds on when we can back Binocular at 5/1 and get paid 1/4 the odds a place.

I think Binocular is nailed on for a place if running to anything like his best and is certainly the one best equipped to take advantage if things don't go right for the Fly. Looks a free each way beat to me.

There are far too many negatives about Zarkandar for me to consider backing him at 5/1. He's too young and too inexperienced on the trends.  Props to him if he wins it - but he certainly won't be carrying any of my money at that price.

The only others I would remotely consider at a price are Thousand Stars and Brampour. Neither are likely to trouble the front 2 in the market but they are decent enough prices at 25/1 and 50/1 respectively.

My bets:

Hefty each way on Binocular at 5/1. I may also have a bet  in the W/O Hurricane Fly market at around 5/2

Small each way on Thousand Stars and Brampour at 25/1 and 50/1 respectively.

In my next post I will give you my idea of the value in the Queen Mother - probably my biggest bet of the week will be in that one.

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Finally today, many thanks to everybody who has signed up for the tipping league I've set up over at:

 http://fantasyracing.telegraph.co.uk/select-team

Make sure you sign up - it's free and I've put up some great prizes for the first three (over and above the prizes being offered by the Telegraph).

The pin number for our league is: 8000357

However, in my previous post, I did forget to mention that I will only be allowing one entry per person into the Make Your Betting Pay league, to make it all completely fair. Could anyone who has entered more than once please contact me regarding which of their teams I should remove. If I don't hear, I will remove entries at random to ensure that there is only one entry per person.

I hope that's fair.

Have a great evening and look out for my mails in the coming days if you're interested in what I'll be on in all the feature races.

Kieran