Champion Hurdle Challenge Trophy - Tuesday 15th

[BillyHills]

Champion Hurdle Challenge Trophy

[BillyHills]

Champion Hurdle Preview

 

Verdict:

Difficult race to weigh up without Faugheen and Arctic Fire. The public will no doubt get behind Annie Power if she is declared and she could start a very false price in my opinion. The facts are in the formbook and I think Nichols Canyon has very solid credentials. He ran well here last year when third in the Neptune and many have come from that race to win a Champion Hurdle the following year. We do have to forgive his run last time out but he probably didn’t have enough time off after his battle with Identity Thief in December.

Of the English runners I think The New One is pretty bombproof, you get what you see with him but its his third go now and maybe the youngster Top Notch can grab a place at a decent price.

Selections:

Nichols Canyon 11/2 Stan James

Top Notch EW 16/1 William Hill

[PeterX]

With Faugheen and Arctic Fire both ruled out the race has lost a fair bit of quality

First and foremost the face revolves around Annie Power, she's the talking horse and makes the market. She has a 100% record barring two outings at Cheltenham where she's lost twice. But the form isn't bad and it's still good course form, coming second in a World Hurdle that really stretched her stamina and falling at the last when clear in the Mares Hurdle. She's got a habit of winning races albeit not against much notable opposition. She gets 2 1/2 miles but I can't see the drop back to 2miles a problem for her whatsoever. She's been winning Grade 1 mares races over 2m2f at a canter. 

The New One isn't without his supporters but I don't think I could be backing him here, he's had his chances in this race acouple times and has come up short, I don't see any difference apart from him being abit older. The prep run at Haydock was poor, similar to last year, and I think he'd be better off over abit further.

Nichols Canyon is a decent horse. He's a multiple Grade 1 winner and wouldn't be without a chance but i'm not sure this race will suit him. He was miles back in third in the Irish Champion Hurdle and was sent off favourite for the Neptune last year and failed to win. It could be he's abit better suited to 2m4f on better ground. He definetly has a chance but I'm not that convinced.

My Tent or Yours hasn't been seen on a racecourse for two years and has previously been beaten in the race so I couldn't have him. And of the others I just don't think they're good enough and I wouldn't have them down as Champion Hurdle contenders.

In my opinion Annie Power certainly is the one to beat and is a worthy favourite. She's definitely a class horse and being a mare she receives a 7lb allowance from the rest of the field, on what is a below average field. Which is just a bonus. I think she will win.

Selection: Annie Power 9/4 PaddyPower

 

[beaker1]

 3.30 Cheltenham – Stan James Champion Hurdle Challenge Trophy (Grade 1)

Running well at the previous Cheltenham Festival seems to be the strongest trend for a modern Champion Hurdle with 15 of the last 17 winners registering a placed finish – eight of those had actually won too. Nichols Canyon and the three Triumph Hurdle graduates, Peace And Co, Top Notch and Hargam are the only four to fit this trend, but clearly Annie Power would have also been on the list if she hadn’t dramatically come down at the last in the 2015 Mares’ Hurdle.

Eleven of the last 17 winners were trained in Ireland and, as you might expect, the entry from across the sea is strong again this year despite the absence of last year’s Irish 1-2 in Faugheen and Arctic Fire. The Willie Mullins-trained trio of Nichols Canyon, Annie Power and Sempre Medici join Henry De Bromhead’s Identity Thief in the raiding party and between them; it looks as if they could have the market, and most likely the race itself, cornered.

But as one of the most open-looking Champion Hurdles in recent times, it could well be another good chance for the average SP of the winner (currently 10/1) to rise. There have been three winners at 16/1 or bigger in the last 12 years, and that’s a significant percentage in a Championship race. Many of this year’s ‘outsiders’ are younger, improving horses, so it would be foolish to rule out anything simply based on their position in the market, especially something like Camping Ground who, despite his price of 20/1, is the official top-rated horse in this year’s race and could still be unexposed in this sphere after just seven runs over hurdles.

With only one of the last nine winners having run more than 12 times over timber, it seems that experience is by no means any guarantee of success, so black marks go up against The New One, who may well have missed his chance to win the big one when he was at the top of his game a couple of years ago and Lil Rockerfeller, this season’s revelation in handicaps, while ante-post favourite and supplementary entry Annie Power only just squeezes onto the right side of the fence.

Having said that, five-year-olds haven’t reached the top of the tree since Katchit’s win in 2008 (1 win from 94 runners since 1985) and it’s been six or seven-year-olds that have dominated the race in the last ten years with seven wins between them. Even though this race does look hugely open, last year’s aforementioned Triumph Hurdle trifecta could well find this a step too far so early in their careers along with the admirable Lil Rockerfeller.

This is a very difficult race to make head or tail of – Nichols Canyon comes out narrowly on top in terms of boxes ticked, with stablemate Sempre Medici, a current 25/1 shot, lurking one behind. It’s fascinating that Mullins’ supposed 3rd string, ridden by David Mullins, comes out so close to Nichols Canyon and if he had finished a little closer to Wicklow Brave in the County Hurdle last year after encountering trouble at the last, he could well have joined him at the top of the ‘trends table’. There has been some support at big prices for the horse and if the ground continues to dry out, he could be in with a chance, even though neither Ruby Walsh nor Paul Townend will be aboard.

The joker in the pack here is My Tent Or Yours, who after being off for two years, was always unlikely to fair brilliantly when looking at the trends. Even so, he is still a Grade 1 winner, has placed in a Champion Hurdle and on his best form, would take a lot of beating here. If Nicky Henderson has the horse at his best after the long break – something he’s done many times before – he could have a great chance, but that’s a gargantuan ‘if’.

Oddly, the top rated horse in the race, Camping Ground, has never even competed in a Grade 1 race, let alone won one, and over a trip short of his best he’ll surely struggle to keep pace with the proven top performers here, a comment that could also apply to Lil Rockerfeller.

As for the Triumph Hurdle top three from last year, it wouldn’t surprise me to see Hargam improving past the battler Top Notch and the out-of-sorts Peace And Co on the probable good to soft/good ground. Mark Walsh has been booked for the ride and if you look at the form of the Christmas Hurdle, run on sticky ground Hargam wouldn’t have enjoyed (looked deeper than the official ‘good to soft’ description), he was just under a length behind The New One, so there’s potential for more there at a decent price (25/1). As for Nigel Twiston-Davies’ charge, the trainer says he’s happier than he’s ever been with him coming into a Champion Hurdle and he can’t be ruled out if putting his best foot forward. However, he’s looked laboured recently and it’s almost as if there’s still something ailing him – he’s been outpaced in these good races before running on time after time and I just wonder whether his chance went in 2014.

Although Identity Thief is high on the list as an improving young horse who could well have the scope to make a splash at this level, especially on better ground than when he gave Nichols Canyon a fright at Leopardstown, in the end it’s certainly difficult to look too far beyond the Mullins entries once again, particularly considering connections shelled out £20,000 to make sure Annie Power got a run and Nichols Canyon is the only horse to have ever bested Faugheen.

Graham Wylie’s six-year-old looks an extremely solid proposition as a six-time Grade 1 winner and should benefit from a positive ride that will see him in his best light, while that could also benefit the mare, helping her to settle. The nagging doubt for me with Nichols Canyon is that, even more so on better ground, this trip may be too short for him and any injection of pace coming round the home turn from Annie Power could find him quickly off the bridle and chasing her vainly up the hill.
It’s been odd to see and hear the amount of negatives people have been coming up with when mentioning Annie Power – yes she’s probably way too short in the market, she does have a 0 from 2 record at Cheltenham (unlucky last year and outstayed over 3m in 2014) and no this wasn’t the plan from the start of the season, but she’s clearly still an extremely high-class mare, who has a lot of speed and staying power in a potent mix. The 7lb mares’ allowance is huge in this context and the fact that Ruby Walsh stays faithful to her tells you a lot given the proven quality of Nichols Canyon. She’s the most likely winner for me, even though she’s not a strong betting proposition, and it will be very interesting to see if the two stablemates dictate the pace from the front and whether that means they’ll take each other on too much. In the end, I can see both Nichols Canyon and Annie Power being right there over the last and that’s when the weight difference could tell.

 The Mullins yard have also dominated the 2m division for a couple of years now, and although it may require more to replicate the 1-2-3 the yard had 12 months ago without Faugheen, Arctic Fire and Hurricane Fly, Sempre Medici cannot be overlooked lightly and he looks a big each-way player at 25/1. He’s an improving horse and I can easily seem him being in the mix for the money.

Shortlist

Annie Power

Sempre Medici

Nichols Canyon

[BillyHills]

Wow, Annie Power was impressive

Well done to those who backed her.