Waiting Is Nearly Over!

Unsurprisingly given it was the final week before the Cheltenham Festival, last week was a quiet one on the runners front with just Great Choice running at Exeter on Tuesday prior to a handful of runners at Sandown during their two day meeting and a sole runner at Chepstow on Saturday.

With only 24 hours to go now until the start of the biggest four day of National Hunt racing in the world I hope you will forgive me if this week’s blog is not as long as in other weeks – I am sure you will appreciate that there is still an enormous amount to be done; declaring for the Festival races, making sure we are choosing the best option for each horse, making alternate plans for those that may not get in some of the handicaps, as well as overseeing exercise and feeding of the horses, as well as dealing with the logistical challenges of getting one large team of extremely valuable bloodstock transported to the racecourse.

Hopefully you will have seen and enjoyed the series of video interviews with some of the people involved in the preparation of the horses over the last week. We have not had any media at the yard for a number of weeks in the build-up to the Festival so this really was exclusive content for the followers of www.davidpipe.com. I would like to extend my grateful thanks once again to our good friend, broadcaster Mike Vince for his time and effort in the production of these interviews – it is very much appreciated. If you missed any of them over the past seven days, you can still catch them on Chester’s Daily Chat from the news menu at the top of this page.

As stated, it was a quiet week last week. Great Choice finished third at Exeter on Tuesday in a novices’ hurdle over 2m7½f. He shapes as though he may need slightly less of a test of stamina and judged on his excellent reappearance second at Cheltenham in November, there are certainly races to be won with him yet.

I thought that Serienschock ran a great race at Sandown on Friday when finishing runner-up in the 2m6f handicap hurdle. There is still room for improvement in his jumping but there was much to like about the way he stuck to his guns under an aggressive ride from Tom Scudamore. He clearly ‘bumped into one’ here – a rapidly improving and thoroughly unexposed horse of Nicky Henderson’s. Nevertheless, he finished well clear of the remainder and this was an excellent effort. His consistency however does bring its own problems as he will surely go up in the weights, something that keeps happening even though he is yet to get his head in front for me.

It was the Imperial Cup at Sandown on Saturday and the stable was doubly represented in this valuable handicap in which we have such a rich tradition. Unfortunately neither Bidourey nor Heath Hunter could add to our tally of nine successes with favourite Bidourey proving particularly disappointing. Perhaps the hustle and bustle of such a competitive handicap came too soon in his career, but he is clearly much better than this. He is only four years old and was bought as a chaser for the future so to already have won five races is more than could ever have been expected. There will be plenty of other exciting days to be had with him.

Fortunately we did not end the week empty handed as Molo (pictured right) was a very impressive winner of the mares’ handicap hurdle at Chepstow in the hands of Liam Heard on Saturday, taking our seasonal tally to 103. Always jumping and travelling well in the first time blinkers, there were few anxious moments and she looked most progressive. There is no reason why she cannot continue to improve and with such a good program of mares’ events open to her there should be plenty of opportunities.

Anyway, unless you have been on another planet for the last few weeks, you will be aware that the Cheltenham Festival starts tomorrow and that is where we will be having our next runners, even though there is a meeting at our local track, Taunton this afternoon (Monday).

Sail By The Sea will be our first runner of the Festival when he goes in the Arkle Chase. He will be a big price but he is a very good horse and we will be hoping that history can repeat itself as Western Warhorse was a shock winner for us twelve months ago. He will be joined tomorrow by Gevrey Chambertin, Swing Bowler and Broadway Buffalo.

As always, it is extremely tough and I would be delighted with just one winner. Even so, we go there with some excellent chances with the likes of Kings Palace, Moon Racer, Un Temps Pour Tout representing the yard, plus many others in the handicaps. For all the latest news on our runners do remember to keep up to date with Chester’s Daily Chat or follow us on Twitter @DavidPipeRacing. The waiting is nearly over…

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