Donn McClean: Cheltenham Festival Day 1 Banker, Next Best And Each-Way Bets
Racing TV pundit Donn McClean is at the heart of the action at Cheltenham and he has three selections for the opening day of the Festival.
Donn has picked out a banker, a next best and one each-way tip from Tuesday's races.
He kicks things off with his nap of the day in the Champion Hurdle which seems to be a three-way battle between Lossiemouth, The New Lion and Brighterdaysahead, according to betting sites.
Donn McClean's Cheltenham Tips: Day 1 (Tuesday)
Banker: 16:00 Cheltenham - Lossiemouth (Champion Hurdle)
Lossiemouth is the correct favourite for the Champion Hurdle, now that she has been given the go-ahead to contest the race.
Willie Mullins’ mare is remarkable. She has run 17 times over hurdles, winning 13 times, finishing second on three occasions and falling once.
She looked as good as ever when she won the Morgiana Hurdle on her debut this season, and when she won the Grade 1 December Hurdle at Leopardstown at Christmas.
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She does have to bounce back from her defeat last time to Brighterdaysahead in the Irish Champion Hurdle, but she never looked happy that day.
There is every chance that she will be able to leave that run behind, and the fact that she is running in the Champion Hurdle and not in the Mares’ Hurdle again suggests that connections think that she will.
Brighterdaysahead is a big danger. She was brilliant at Leopardstown last time, but she has always been good at Leopardstown.
The two best runs of her life have been at the Foxrock track. By contrast, she has run twice at Cheltenham, and she was beaten twice.
There were excuses for both defeats. It may not have been down to the track at all, and Gordon Elliott reports her in top form. She is a seriously talented mare.
But Lossiemouth is four from four at Cheltenham and loves the place. The fitting of cheekpieces for the first time could elicit further improvement. She is the one they all have to beat.
Next Best: 13:20 Cheltenham - Talk The Talk (Supreme Novices' Hurdle)
Talk The Talk is unlucky not to be a dual Grade 1 winner already.
Impressive in winning a Grade 3 four-year-olds’ hurdle at Fairyhouse’s Hatton’s Grace Hurdle meeting in November, he looked all set for victory in the Grade 1 Future Champions’ Novice Hurdle at Leopardstown over Christmas when he came down at the final flight.
He made amends next time, though, in the Grade 1 Tattersalls Ireland Novice Hurdle, back at Leopardstown, at the Dublin Racing Festival in February, when he did really well to win, coming from back in the field off a sedate pace.
The race was run to suit the prominent racers and, sure enough, Ballyfad and King Rasko Grey, who ultimately finished second and third respectively behind Talk The Talk, both raced prominently from early.
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Talk The Talk was no better than eighth passing the two-furlong marker. He had to make his ground into a quickening pace, but he did.
He showed his class and his speed and his determination to get up and beat two talented novices in Ballyfad and King Rasko Grey, with the three of them finishing nicely clear of Koktail Brut and Blake, who had finished first and second respectively in the Grade 2 Royal Bond Hurdle.
It’s rock solid novice hurdling form. There is no knowing how good Joseph O’Brien’s horse could be.
Out of a half-sister to Goshen, he could go right to the very top in time, and he could bag a Supreme Novices’ Hurdle on his way there.
Best Each-Way: 17:20 Cheltenham - Iceberg Theory (National Hunt Chase)
Iceberg Theory could take a nice step forward now when he steps up in trip to contest the National Hunt Chase.
Paul Nolan’s horse stayed on well to get the better of Boston Rover in a beginners’ chase run over two miles and six and a half furlongs at Limerick last May, and Boston Rover then went and won his next three races. He is now rated 134.
Iceberg Theory didn’t run again after that until November, when, again, he stayed on well at the end of two miles and five furlongs to win a handicap chase at Cork, racing off a mark of 120.
The form of that race was enhanced, too, by the runner-up O’Toole, who won a good handicap chase at Leopardstown last Monday. He is now rated 8lb higher then he was then.
Iceberg Theory was raised by 9lb for that win to an Irish mark of 129, and his British mark is 4lb higher again, but he could be progressive enough to be able to cope with his new British mark of 133.
A seven-year-old who has run just three times over fences, he has buckets of scope for further progression. And he shapes as if he will improve again for the step up in trip.
He hasn’t run since November, but he goes well fresh. His record after a break of 60 days or more reads 331311.
Also, the astute Paul Nolan sent out Daily Present to win the Kim Muir at last year’s Cheltenham Festival, and he is always a man to be respected when he targets a horse at a big Cheltenham handicap.
