Boxing Day Racing Tips: Diarmuid Nolan’s 3 Best Bets At Kempton And Leopardstown
Boxing Day (St Stephen's Day to the Irish) is one of the best days of racing of the year.
It is both plentiful and laden with quality. It is every racing fan's dream, and an ideal way to recover from the Christmas Day festivities.
This year is as good as any as I can remember, and below are three horses to keep on side throughout the day and their best prices to be found on betting sites.
14:30 Kempton: King George VI Chase - Jango Baie 1pt Win @ 3/1 (NAP)
This is one of the juiciest King George’s in recent memory, and while there are several top-class challengers from Irish shores, I feel this can stay in England with Jango Baie and the evergreen Nicky Henderson.
Fact To File and Gaelic Warrior will be very popular, no doubt, after a superb battle in the John Durkan at Punchestown, and while both have every chance of taking this, I feel they may be bumping into an exciting new rival with a higher ceiling of ability.
I will put it this way, I am not negative on either of these horses’ chances, I just feel they may meet one better.
I backed Banbridge to take this race last year, but I am not a fan of his prep this time around.
Djelo and The Jukebox Man are wonderful horses for connections, but I do not think they are good enough to lower the colours of Fact To File, Gaelic Warrior and Jango Baie.
The remaining duo, Il Est Francais and Master Chewy, have not shown a single piece of form this season to place them into the reckoning.
Why am I so confident in Jango Baie? I think, to win a King George, you need to have pace, be able to adapt tactically and then stay at the end to see off your rivals.
The latter is the only slight question mark here, but I feel he will easily stay this trip.
He was pacy enough to win an Arkle last season, and while that was a miracle, it did show his raw ability.
Less than three weeks later, he went on to run an absolute blinder up in trip at Aintree in third and came out of that with plenty of plaudits as a plethora of other horses who ran well at Cheltenham went on to flounder in Liverpool.
He looked better than ever this season in a nice renewal of the 1965 Chase over 2m4f at Ascot and seemed to me like a horse who will not have any issue getting three miles.
I believe he is the one to beat and can take this en route to a tilt at the 2026 Cheltenham Gold Cup.
Tactically, he can adapt here and sit off what is sure to be a strong pace – this is the key part of this race for me.
I see him and Fact To File coming to the last closing on the front and battling up the run-in with Jango Baie coming out on top.
That easy, eh?
13:20 Kempton: Kauto Star Novices' Chase - Wendigo 1pt Win @ 11/4 (NB)
Kitzbuhel will be all the rage here for Willie Mullins and Paul Townend, but he looked a blatant non-stayer to me at Aintree last year over this trip.
Therefore, I am happy to take him on with Wendigo, who should adore going up in distance over fences and is a better price with betting apps.
Wendigo did his best work late last time out and showed plenty of stamina when taking a Grade 2 at Newbury.
While the second did let that form down somewhat of late, I do feel the winner can be marked up as he was caught for speed badly before staying on.
As already mentioned, I don’t feel that Kitzbuhel is at his best over this trip, and Salver is backing up quite quickly after Sandown, where the ground was quite taxing.
I am happy to take on the rest.
Everything will suit Wendigo perfectly, and there are enough chinks in his rivals' armour to think he can have his big day on December 26 at Kempton.
14:55 Leopardstown: Racing Post Handicap Chase - The King Of Prs 0.5pts Each-Way
Gavin Cromwell could well be the trainer to follow over Christmas.
After a terrible early part of the season where his horses simply were finishing empty, there are noticeable signs the show is well and truly back on for this superb team.
The King Of Prs might be one to make a clear step forward as a result.
In this race last season, The King Of Prs was very unlucky in third, with the trainer saying afterwards that they felt they had completely got their tactics wrong on the day.
He went on to win next time and realistically just found himself a bit too high in the handicap afterwards.
After some poor runs, he now finds himself only 4lb higher than last year and stable jockey Keith Donoghue being onboard can only help his chances.
Last time, he showed signs of bouncing back when travelling well and should step forward markedly for that effort.
He might be near the top of the weights, but at his best, he is better than most of these, and while it is a big field, it is a race that is not that deep with quality.
Do you have any fancies for the Boxing Day bonanza of racing? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!
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