After what is sure to be an exciting Day 1 of the Cheltenham Festival, the punters go into battle with the bookmakers on Day 2 and many people will be looking to find a winner or two and give themselves plenty of ammunition for the final two days of the meeting.
Neptune Investment Management Novices’ Hurdle – 2.05
There are two horses that are vying to be favourite for this particular race, although So Young seems to be attracting the most money and it means that Ladbrokes are one of few firms that are currently quoting 7/2.
Willie Mullins looks as though he will have the French import in excellent nick for the Festival and the five-year-old has achieved a couple of impressive victories in Ireland this year. Oscars Well represents the main danger and jockey Robbie Power is sweet on his chances.
“Oscars Well is probably my best chance. He’s done nothing but improve all winter and being by Oscar, I’m fully convinced that when he gets better ground, he’ll improve again.”
RSA Steeplechase – 2.40
Can anyone stop Time For Rupert winning this race? This is many people’s Festival banker and the horse is now a best price 9/4 (Ladbrokes) to land the third race of the Wednesday at the Cheltenham Festival. Paul Webber’s stable star has got all the credentials to land a victory for jockey Will Kennedy.
Not that we should forget that there are some other class horses in the race and that includes Jessies Dream (8/1 Paddy Power), AiteenThirtyThree (9/1 Coral) and Mikael D’haguenet (12/1 William Hill).
Queen Mother Champion Chase – 3.20
Sporting Bet are sponsoring this race for the first time and they will be pleased by how competitive the contest is looking at the moment. The headline horses are Big Zeb and Master Minded, with the former winning the race in 2010 after victories by the latter in 2008 and 2009.
Big Zeb will be ridden by Barry Geraghty and bet365 offer 3/1 about the Irish raider proving too good for the rest of the field, with the jockey claiming that this horse is in the same ilk as Moscow Flyer.
Even so, Master Minded (10/3 Ladbrokes) won the Victor Chandler Chase in December and will have Ruby Walsh back in the saddle, with Paul Nicholls expecting big things from a horse that didn’t perform to expectations twelve months ago.
There have been a couple of market movers in the past couple of months and it finally appears as though Somersby will run in this race rather than the Ryanair, something which means that the horse could do with some cut in the ground. Paddy Power’s 7/1 seems like a decent each-way price.
Then there is Sizing Europe, a horse that won the Arkle last year and is reported to be schooling very well in Ireland. Ladbrokes now offer 8/1 about a horse that was 12/1 a week ago.
