Melbourne, Vic (March 16, 2010) - Fans of jumps racing in Australia are gearing up for a few late nights this week to take in the famous ‘Festival’ at Cheltenham.

Cheltenham has all the stars of the jumps season battling for success and the ‘Festival’ has become known as the Olympics.  Luckly, for us Sky Racing and the TAB are covering the meeting.  

Victorain trainer Anthony Cosgriff has not managed to get his star jumper Gorge to the festival as he suffered a injury to his ‘near-side’ (left) knee.  While his other horse, Onajet, wasn’t up to the class required for Cheltenham, and, will miss running in the novice hurdle.  Cosgriff, is mighty proud of Onajet’s fourth at Ayr and did give the horseman the honour of being the first ever Australian trainer to have a horse run in Scotland.

The first day features a huge team of top class Irish horses taking on the best of Britain’s hurdlers, steeplechasers and novice horses to compete for glory in front of Melbourne Cup size crowds. 

Irish horses could get off to a great start with the likes of Dunguib, Captain Ceebee, Sizing Europe and Go Native in action on a day that sees the running of the £370,000 Grade One Smurfit Kappa Champion Hurdle. 

The defending champion Punjabi is one of three runners for trainer Nick Henderson along with Binocular, who finished third last year, and Zaynar, victorious in the JCB Triumph Hurdle last year.

If Henderson were to win the hurdling championship this year, he would join Peter Easterby as the most successful handler in the race’s history with five wins, following Punjabi’s victory and the hat-trick achieved by See You Then (1985, 1986 and 1987).

The Irish team are also represented in the Champion Hurdle by last year’s Supreme Novices’ Hurdle victor Go Native.  

Champion trainer Paul Nicholls, has the services of Ruby Walsh for last year’s runner-up Celestial Halo, while Khyber Kim, trained locally by Nigel Twiston-Davies, will attempt to maintain his 100 per cent record at Cheltenham this season. Twiston-Davies has unerring faith in the eight-year-old, who laid down his championship claims in the autumn. After clinching a course and distance victory in the Grade Three Greatwood Hurdle at The Open in November, Khyber Kim saw off last season’s Champion Hurdle runner-up Celestial Halo to take the Grade Two International, with Medermit third and reigning champion Punjabi back in fourth.

The Festival gets underway with the traditional curtain-raiser, the £100,000 Grade One Spinal Research Supreme Novices’ Hurdle, headed by Dunguib. The seven-year-old, triumphant in the 2009 Champion Bumper and unbeaten over hurdles.

A vintage renewal of the £150,000 Grade One The Irish Independent Arkle Trophy has 12 starters.  Captain Cee Bee, trained in Ireland by Eddie Harty, has tab number one and is seeking a second success at The Festival following his victory in the Novices’ Hurdle two years ago. Another leading contender Sizing Europe, another from Ireland, and the former top-class hurdler is unbeaten in four starts over fences. Henrietta Knight, trainer of the triple Cheltenham Gold Cup hero Best Mate, looks to have another star on her hands in Somersby who is unbeaten in both his outings over fences so far this season.

The other race is the £80,000 Grade Three William Hill Trophy Handicap Chase, for which there is 24 acceptors.

Coverage commences tonight at 12.30 (AEDT) - with the Champion Hurdle on at 2:20am

Tags: Cheltenham Gold Cup, jumps racing
Permalink| Mar 16, 2010

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