UK Horse Racing Tips

At the time of writing, the 2018 Cheltenham Festival is less than a month away, and punters are eyeing up the latest Cheltenham tips, yet the most successful jockey at the Festival, Rupert ‘Ruby’ Walsh, has yet to return to the saddle. Walsh remains sidelined with the latest in a series of serious injuries, a fractured right tibia, sustained during a fall from Let’s Dance at Punchestown in November. Ironically, it was the victory of the same horse in the Trull House Stud Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle last year that took his Cheltenham Festival total to 56 winners.

Walsh, 38, rode his first Cheltenham Festival winner two decades ago, when Alexander Banquet, trained by Willie Mullins, ran on well to beat the favourite, Joe Mac, in the Weatherbys Champion Bumper. Two years later, aged just 20, he won the Grand National on Papillon, trained by his father Ted, a victory he describes as the “proudest moment of my career.”

In October 2002, Walsh became retained rider for Paul Nicholls and so began one of the most successful partnerships in National Hunt racing. Walsh was leading jockey at the Festival for the first time in 2004 and six more times before he split with Nicholls to spend more time in Ireland with his young family. He said at the time, “The future for me will be Naas instead of Newbury and Navan instead of Haydock, but it will also be home for dinner with Gillian and the girls [two daughters, both under five] rather than a quick coffee at breakfast.”

Having switched allegiance to his other major employer, County Carlow trainer Willie Mullins, Walsh has proved an even greater force to be reckoned with at the Cheltenham Festival, winning the leading jockey title in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. Walsh is reportedly a week, or two, away from a return to race riding but, all being well, Footpad – currently 11/8 favourite for the Arkle Challenge Trophy on March 13 – may well provide him with winner number 57.

In the C&S Electrical Handicap Hurdle (3.45) at Taunton on Tuesday, course and distance winner Our Merlin has looked in the grip of the handicapper since stepped up in class at Sandown two starts ago. Indeed, Robert Walford’s 6-year-old has been raised 4lb and 1lb for finishing second and third, respectively, the last twice, making an eye-watering total of 42lb since opening his account in a lowly 0-100 handicap hurdle at Plumpton in December. Clearly, it’s difficult to argue that he’s well handicapped, but he’s holding his form well and this looks a significantly less competitive contest than those he’s contested recently. His three wins have come at Plumpton, Fontwell and here – all sharp tracks – so it’s conceivable that Sandown and Cheltenham didn’t play to his strengths and the return to less testing underfoot conditions won’t do him any harm either. Regular partner Harry Cobden, who’s 3-6 on him, once again takes the ride.

Selection: Taunton 3.45 Our Merlin to win

With the prestigious 2018 Cheltenham Festival now only a stone’s throw away the bookmaker odds and red top newspaper chatter has already started focusing on who they think this year’s ‘stand out’s might be (no pun!). Might Bite is heavily favoured at just 3-1 to win this year’s Cheltenham Gold Cup with last year’s victor Sizing John also in the running. Of course there may well still be a few changes to the line ups, as one or two fancied horses have already dropped out from this and other Cheltenham races. That’s always important to factor that in, especially if you opt to place an early bet on this or any other race with a potentially large field.

Betting on big horse racing events like the Cheltenham Festival, Royal Ascot or the Grand National can often be a different skill / art than your typical day to day betting. With the Cheltenham Festival just around the corner it’s worth looking out for the latest Cheltenham betting odds for the 2018 festival.  These events are often highly competitive and in my opinion fewer horses slip under the radar (as can more readily happen in day to day betting, where sometimes people get rather gungho on the betting markets without really knowing a lot about what they’re laying or betting on). Weighing up the pros and cons of what to place your money on can be a trickier affair than usual.

That’s not to say there aren’t significant betting opportunities out there. The Cheltenham Gold Cup and other races at the festival have seen huge priced winners over the years and that’s just with bookmakers odds, rather than the betting exchanges. Norton’s Coin is perhaps the name that would first role off the tongue when thinking of Cheltenham betting opportunities of old. He won the Gold Cup at 100-1, then there’s Hardy Eustace winning the 2004 Champion Hurdle at 33-1, Western Warhorse winning the 2014 Arkle Challenge trophy, the list goes on! Sometimes looking for a big priced bet can be a perfectly valid option. Let’s not forget that Hove bookmaker Ben Keith took a £375,000 win bet on Willie Mullins Douvan in the 2017 Queen Mother Champion Chase, only for it to disappoint at odds of 2-9. A betting nightmare for one odds-on loving punter.

So who will be the stand outs of the 2018 Cheltenham Festival I wonder, and are there any horses in particular you’ve had your eye on. I’m naturally inclined to sometimes look beyond the favourites in the betting when I’m approaching races that have one too many unknowns for my liking, which can be true as I’ve said of the big Festivals. There will of course be long and short odds opportunities to bet on over the four day Festival and we’ll be analysing many potential selections from favourites to outsiders closer to the start of this prestigious event which in 2018 starts on 13^th March and ends on 16^th day of the month.

Lanfranco “Frankie” Dettori rode his first winner in Britain in 1987 and, for much of his career, was synonymous with the royal blue silks of the Godolphin organisation, founded by Sheikh Mohammed in 1994. Indeed, on an extraordinary afternoon at Ascot in 1996 Godolphin contributed the majority of his so-called “Magnificent Seven”, when he rode the winner of each of the seven races on the card.

However, the popular Italian was demoted in the Godolphin pecking order in 2012, finally severing all ties with the organisation to become freelance and subsequently served a six-month ban after testing positive for cocaine. On his return to race riding, a frustrating lack of rides led Dettori to seriously consider retirement at the end of the 2013 season.

Thankfully, he was rescued from the doldrums by Sheikh Joaan al Thani, the co-founder of Al Shaqab Racing, who appointed him as retained jockey. Dettori finished a forgettable season with just 16 winners – his lowest total for 25 years – but, the following year, renewed his association with former champion trainer John Gosden, who’d supported him many years before.

Fast forward to 2017 and Dettori rode a highly respectable 63 winners from 237 rides in Britain, at a strike rate of 25%, for a level stakes profit of 45.55 points. He also became the first jockey to win the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe five times, on the superstar filly Enable – fittingly trained by John Gosden – who was recording her fifth Group One victory of the season.

Dettori has been crowned champion Flat jockey three times and while, at the age of 47, he is unlikely to scale those heights again, 30 years, 15,000 races and 3,000-odd winners since he joined Luca Cumani as an apprentice, we haven’t seen the last of his famous flying dismount.