Nyetimber December Gold Cup tips: Podcast preview

Ed Chamberlin

“The Paddy Power Gold Cup form is up at the head of the market and history shows it should be even though it’s a different track and a different trip. It does bare out well.

"It’s very, very tricky. I could make a case for all four of the first five in the Paddy Power. The winner, Il Ridoto, won very easily that day really, the second Ga Law is absolutely rock solid. I remember the interview with Dan Skelton before hand and he said he didn’t know a great deal about Madara and didn’t know what to expect. I think they’ll have been absolutely thrilled and know a lot more now. I think he’ll be ridden differently and he’s a major player then you’ve got Fugitif who this would have been his target. He didn’t look particularly fit that day and I think he clouted at least one of the first two and looked like that was going to be it then coming down hill he was much closer than he was in the December Gold Cup, which he won, last season. He arguably made up too much ground so I think he’s going to be bang there. It’s a tricky, tricky race.”

Graham Cunningham

“Lots of people will be looking to last year’s race when Fugitif got the better of a really good tussle with Il Ridoto. Remember though it was a very unusual race, Il Ridoto and one other went hammer and tongs early doors that day and split the field wide-open, and Fugitif was really well suited by how that race developed.

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“He was unlucky early on in the Paddy Power this year, he was baulked and made a bad mistake before the effort of making a big move down the hill took a toll. You’re probably looking to oppose Il Ridoto because he’s shot up the weights for his win, but Ga Law should also come into consideration.

“Le Patron is a horse who won’t have had much coverage and when he went to Cheltenham in the spring he didn’t shine but he was in Grade One company behind Grey Dawning and co. But the way he jumped and bolted up at Newbury suggests he deserves his place in this too. So it’s a wide-open handicap, not a massive field, these valuable handicaps are struggling to fill nowadays, but there’ll be a wide-open betting market too by the look of things.”

David Johnson

“Everybody looks and thinks the Paddy Power is such a good guide to this race but interestingly if you look down the years I think there’s only been three dual winners and none since Exotic Dancer about 15 years ago.

“I'd probably be looking at a different formline. I’m interested in Grandeur D’Ame, who ran well to finish fourth in the race last year from slightly out of the handicap and he's in the weights this year. He won at Chepstow on his reappearance, beating Ga Law, and I could just see him out-running those current double-figure odds.”

Billy Nash

“Pinkerton is a Galway Plate winner. He won that off 138 and since then has probably improved his rating a little bit when finishing second to Found A Fifty at Down Royal. He got as close to that rival as he was entitled to there and unfortunately for Pinkerton the handicapper has taken as literal a view of that form as he could.

“He now has a BHA rating of 147 which makes things a little more difficult but the plus side is he’s a pretty unexposed horse at this sort of trip. He was campaigned almost exclusively at two miles prior to the Galway Plate and we saw how well he saw that trip out. I wouldn’t put anyone off him. He should certainly run well in a race that will suit him.

“James Du Berlais is a smashing horse in a lot of ways but doesn’t win very often and is probably his own worst enemy. He had a really good season last term but didn’t win and kept going up the handicap as a result.

“He was just touched off in the Topham and ran a cracker at the Festival when it looked like he was going to play a part in the finish of one of those big handicaps for a long way only to get run out of things.

“And that’s where you are with James Du Berlais. Expect him to run well for a long way but he’s up to 155 and started off in handicaps last season from 148 and hasn’t won one yet. He could run well again but I don’t see him winning off that sort of mark.”

Ben Linfoot

“They're all back from the Paddy Power Gold Cup, and I think Il Ridoto has to be respected. He’s won on both Old and New courses at Cheltenham and is a bona fide Cheltenham specialist whatever track they run on.

“He’s up eight pounds but idled up the hill for me in November and could have won that by eight lengths so I don’t think he’s necessarily handicapped out of things even though he’s risen so much in the weights.

“He’s one of three or four on the shortlist, Gemirande is another for Venetia Williams, but the one I like at the minute at the prices is Guard Your Dreams for Nigel Twiston-Davies. He just looks like a bit of a Twisters plot horse to me, has lots of good form at Cheltenham, has won on the New Course over hurdles when he took the International and beat horses rated 155.

“It was the same when he was third in the Relkeel, beating horses who were rated higher than him in the mid-150s.

“Here he is off 136 over fences having had the required three qualifying runs to run in a race of this type. I’ve liked his performances here in October and November, behind Peaky Boy last time, and switching back to the New Course is a positive for him. He’s a horse that comes off the bridle and might even need further later in the season but Saturday, on this track, while he’s an unexposed three-times raced novice, is the time to get him.

“At prices around 20/1 he’s the one I’ve come down on at this stage.”

Matt Brocklebank

“I like Madara from the Paddy Power. He’s about 5/1 and there might still be a bit of juice in that price come raceday itself if the Skeltons have really targeted this prize, for all they haven’t had him particularly long.

“With Sophie Leech last season he won a big Leopardstown handicap and there’s scope for more to come from the five-year-old, but I’d like to flesh out the case for Gemirande toward the bottom of the weights.

“Charlie Deutsch is down to do 10st 2lb which I’m pretty sure would be his minimum weight. He’s a horse who’s kind of flattered to deceive in the past and if you look at last season’s form he just looked to have completely lost the plot.

“He only ran three times so perhaps was struggling with something and maybe something wasn’t quite right. We didn’t see him from mid-April until last month when he came back at Ascot. There was plenty of money around for him that day and he really did bolt up.

“Like Il Ridoto, he’s gone up eight pounds as well for winning a slightly lesser race, but I do think he’s got his mojo back and while he’s never won from a mark as high as 136, he has been thereabouts from ratings in the 130s.

“Venetia Williams can do little wrong at the moment and it seems this eight-year-old is back thriving again. He won ears pricked last time, making all the running and I know he’s going to have a bit of company up in the van in this race - Stage Star, Guard Your Dreams and Ga Law tend to be thereabouts - and it could be an early battle for the lead.

“But if Deutsch can get this lad jumping away like he did at Ascot up in the front rank I suspect it’s going to take a well-handicapped horse to get past him. I wouldn’t underestimate Il Ridoto at 8s and 10s but at 12/1 there’s a bit more meat in Gemirande's price."

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