MARCH IS the month of madness, for hares and punters alike. The National Hunt Festival at Cheltenham, now less than three weeks away, will see millions gambled on horses with little or no chance of winning, as spring fever infects otherwise sane men and women and makes them think that there are such things as certainties round the hallowed Prestbury Park course.
There are none. No certainties at all. Not in any single race. It's why we love and hate Cheltenham so much. But over the next few Sundays I am going to try and show how it is possible to win money at the Festival, or at least not lose too much, by
sticking to a betting policy that could best be described as safety first.
As any professional gambler will tell you, in most of the bigger Festival races, it is a good plan to concentrate on the basics of safe betting – go for horses with form, preferably over course and distance, from established yards with good records at Cheltenham and most important of all, bet on horses which are already well fancied.
Let's be clear: scrofulous nags do not emerge from hidden fields to win the big events at Cheltenham. Well, all except one – Norton's Coin, 100-1 winner of the Gold Cup in 1990, though it turned out he was no donkey as he smashed the record time for the race.
But in the four recognised championships races – Gold Cup, Champion Hurdle, World Hurdle and Champion Chase – and more times than most in the other Grade 1 races, it is nearly always a fancied horse which wins.
Fact: in the last five seasons, all but one of the 20 championship races have been won by horses in the top five in the betting – only Hardy Eustace's surprise Champion Hurdle win in 2004 at odds of 33-1 proving the exception.
Second fact: in all of last year's Grade 1 races, the winner was in the top five in the betting. The conclusion to draw is that if you are serious about betting at Cheltenham, then you must concentrate on the upper end of the market. The returns will not be life-changing, but beating the bookies at all at the Festival would be well nigh a miracle.
By all means do your brains in and bet on every race, because that's the fun of Cheltenham, but spend your pennies on the likes of the handicap hurdles and the Foxhunter's, and keep the pounds for the big races.
Which brings us to this year's Gold Cup. At this moment, there is a clean break between the top five in the betting and the rest of the field, with 2007 winner Kauto Star generally showing around 6-4, followed by stablemates Denman and Neptune Collonges, respectively the winner and third in last year's race, around the 5-1 mark. Madison Du Berlais and Exotic Dancer are 8s and 10s. The rest are 16s or greater.
So the bookies have done the job for us. They think the race is Kauto Star's for the taking, and consider all outside the top five to be outsiders.
The bookmakers should be offering Denman with a run, as Paul Nicholls is not even sure the horse will be fit enough to defend his title. I wrote a fortnight ago that I think the horse is a shadow of his former self and won't take part. Put it this way, just getting him to the post will be one of the greatest feats of Nicholls' career.
Exotic Dancer's brilliant return to form in December's Lexus Chase at Leopardstown, the race in which Neptune Collonges fell, gives him a solid each way chance. Neptune Collonges shrugged off that fall to win the Hennessy Cognac Gold Cup at the Irish track earlier this month, and should again fill a place.
Madison Du Berlais won the Newbury Hennessy and followed up with the Levy Board Chase at Haydock to show he is vastly improved horse. But is he good enough? I don't think so.
I feel Nicholls will rest Denman, going with Kauto Star as his number one choice for the Gold Cup. That will make the Star favourite and he is my choice from the big five to win the Blue Riband.
The full article contains 726 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
