I’m hoping to back the winner of the last major jump race of the season – the Bet365 Gold Cup (The old Whitbread) at Sandown, 2.15.
I’ve been watching Certainly Red’s improvement through this season. He started off on a mark of 116, and now sits on 142, representing an improvement of almost two stones. I’m pretty sure there is more to come, and already have him down as a Grand National horse for next year.
The betting on this race on Monday saw a couple of offers of 20/1: I resisted betting or tipping him, as I have found it best over the season to await the 48 hour decs before risking cash. He’s now 10/1 after steady daily support. Were he trained by one of the big guns, he’d nearly be favourite. Lydia Richards has done a fine job with him in training and placing, and I suspect this has been the long term plan since he won with such verve at Wincanton in December.
He’ll be fine in any ground with ease in it, and his victories over staying trips suggest that this 3m5f will be all right for him. He won at Sandown in January over 20f, this despite jumping badly left at the last. He followed that up with another Wincanton victory over 3m1f, surging clear on the run-in. He then had a two-month holiday before reappearing over hurdles as, I assume, a pipe opener for this big one. The good conditional Caoilin Quinn takes an extra 5lbs off his back giving him a weight of 10.5.
I’d normally pick two or three in a race like this, but in this case I’m more than happy to stick with Certainly Red and he’s a strongly recommended EW bet at 10/1 to 6 places with Bet365 (others offer 9s or shorter)
Good luck all
Joe
My usual warning. Anything I put up as a tip here is for ‘fun money’ – stakes you can afford to lose almost without even thinking about it. There’s just as much fun to be had with small stakes.
P&L for this jumps season: £163 to £5 unit stakes.
Steeplechasing 