Dan Skelton and Paul Nicholls react to Turners' Novices' Chase becoming handicap

The news broke in Tuesday’s Racing Post with the Peter Scargill's report also saying the cross-country chase will switch to being a handicap.

Skelton won the Turners last season with Grey Dawning and he told Tuesday’s Nick Luck Daily Podcast: “I was actually surprised this one came under the axe first. I thought personally there was more snipping and changing to do to other races before you got to this one.

“If this has had some tinkering with then there has to be others who have had more tinkering with. But it does feel a shame to lose a Grade One, that’s first and foremost. People do want to compete for Grade Ones and even the sponsors have said they are disappointed this has happened.

“I just think it’s a bit of a downgrading and I think we could have looked at other races and let this race sort of continue. I know it’s been short on numbers but it hasn’t been short on quality. I’m a bit surprised that it has been so quick to have been amended.

“I thought the most obvious change, and it wouldn’t really affect me at all, is to get the cross-country into a handicap which they’ve done. I thought that was the most obvious. Beyond that there’s tweaks and changes without massive cuts and alterations but in general what you have to remember is the programme works, it has a history of working, it’s just got a recent history of not quite hitting the marks we want it to.

“But that’s for competition and supply reasons rather than the races are actually wrong. Of course, if you change the races around you change the supply dynamic but I don’t think we want to be taking a chainsaw to the programme just yet.

“Little changes are fine and we did some changes the year before because sometimes you get the odd Graded race which isn’t supported enough through the season but I just think there are other races that, if Cheltenham said they were going to do some reviews, I would have changed before this.”

Nicholls, who saddled Ginny’s Destiny to chase home Grey Dawning and won the 2023 Turners with Stage Star, understands the decision – and thinks the new race will still be a viable option for high-class two-and-a-half mile novice chasers.

Again speaking on the Nick Luck Daily Podcast he said: “You’ve got lots of other options, you either go in one of the other two races, and with those two horses you might possibly have stepped up in trip, or you wait and keep them fresh for the Grade One at Aintree.

“You’d have to decide that and it’s now going to be a handicap so you have the option to run in that too if you want to. It’s going to divide opinion, it’s not going to please everyone, but anything we can do to improve the competitiveness of racing, I get it.

“There’s no reason why they wouldn’t run well in it as a handicap. Stage Star won the Paddy Power Gold Cup last year off top weight so why wouldn’t he have won the Turners if it was a handicap in that spring?

“Normally the best horse in a handicap can still win, it’s why they’re top weight and you shouldn’t be afraid of running under top weight in a handicap if you didn’t think two or just over three miles were appropriate trips for your horse in March.

“It will divide opinion, not everyone will be happy but we just have to get on with it. If it improves the competitiveness of the race, then so be it but last year’s renewal was probably as good a race as there was at the Festival.

“All these changes at Cheltenham aren’t set in stone. If it doesn’t work, they’re not adverse to going back. It’s just to see if it all works and we just have to get on with it.”

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