Jumps racing reaction: What next for Gerri Colombe and Bravemansgame?

Plans can change, but not always as you might expect

I’m occasionally accused of being a bit soft when it comes to excusing horses a poor run or two, but it almost becomes second nature when you’re regularly foraging around for truffles towards the bottom end of the market.

It must be all very dull simply focusing on the ones with all the ones by their names, but what to make of the weekend comeback efforts of two of the biggest names in the staying chase division – Bravemansgame and Gerri Colombe?

Let’s start with the former, who went off 11/10 favourite in the Charlie Hall Chase despite not adding a single one to his name since winning the 2022 King George, but managed only a well-held second - three and a half-lengths behind the aggressively-ridden The Real Whacker. The winner is a fun horse with a fun name who is capable of some serious form on good ground, and he should remain a factor in small-field events while able to dominate, particularly away from the Irish.

Too many caveats to make him a genuine King George and Gold Cup contender? The layers would appear to think so given he’s around 40s and 50s for Kempton and Cheltenham.

The runner-up's is becoming something of an ironic moniker one suspects, after hearing Harry Cobden refer quite pointedly to the option of headgear following an extended conflab with owner Bryan Drew in the Wetherby winners’ circle.

I think we can just about draw a line through his chances of winning another King George and the revised 100/1 about Bravemansgame landing a first Gold Cup at the age of 10 next spring would need another digit to encourage me into looking twice.

No, this one's time at the top table has seemingly now elapsed, that ding-dong battle with Galopin Des Champs in March '23 arguably a career peak - though a rather costly one in the wider picture.

But hold up a second, it’s Mr Soft here holding a tray of ready-made excuses.

Didn't some rash folk suggest it was curtains for Protektorat as a G1 animal before he won the Ryanair Chase last March, and wasn’t it a similar sort of story that played out with Envoi Allen prior to his victory in the same Festival event the year before that?

Over to Nicholls, who seemed to dash those pipe dreams almost before they were even conceived speaking to Betfair in his ‘Ditcheat Diary’ on Monday morning: "He’s in the Coral Gold Cup, which is an option. It’s a race I always thought might suit him as it can often suit the classier horses with a bit more weight."

He went on to mention the Grand National as a possible option too, so chances of a still relatively spring-heeled Bravemansgame dropping back in trip at some point to try and utilise that accurate jumping of his clearly aren’t on the trainer's mind, not yet at least.

Not a bad horse overnight

Bravemansgame will be 10 next spring and Gerri Colombe will be nine, remarkably, but you can see why most pundits are being a bit more forgiving in light of his odds-on reverse in Saturday’s Ladbrokes Champion Chase at Down Royal. He’s more lightly raced, for a start, and did win twice at the highest level during his first season outside of novice company last time around.

If you’d just landed from the planet Zog and hadn't realised his trainer Gordon Elliott won almost every other decent race going at the two-day meeting in the north, then you’d be forgiven for suggesting Gerri Colombe needed the run.

That’s basically how he shaped to me, which is no doubt wide of the mark, but stamina is clearly his forte and the (good-to-yielding) ground may have played more into the hands of eventual winner Envoi Allen and tough runner-up Hewick.

Where now for Gerri? Having been duffed up twice by Galopin Des Champs himself last term, it was obviously a good sign to see him end the campaign with a major victory at Aintree back in April, and there’s no way his Gold Cup hopes have suddenly gone up in smoke on the back of one disappointing effort in early-November.

Saturday was the first time this talented horse has finished outside of the first two in his 14 lifetime starts and, with Leopardstown a bit flat and speed-orientated, and occasionally still lively enough underfoot over Christmas, I’d maintain his best chance of landing a big one would be in the biggest one of all at Cheltenham, for which he was eased to 16/1 in places.

Elliott might have one or two regrets about running Gerri Colombe in last year’s Savills Chase and would be wise to reconsider a Prestbury Park reccie in the Cotswold Chase instead this winter, something that was mooted 12 months ago before Leopardstown came up 'suitably soft'.

Aintree already in mind for Ascot victor

Elsewhere, there was another timely reminder at Ascot on Saturday that class counts for plenty in the handicap ranks too after Our Champ and Chianti Classico defied top weight of 12 stone in the Lavazza Handicap Hurdle and Sodexo Gold Cup respectively.

The former had the benefit of Freddie Gordon claiming 5lb but Chianti Classic’s effort was absolutely textbook and no doubt secured his spot in a fast lane on the Grand National trail.

Having fancied the second, the unexposed and progressive Highstakesplayer, I just had to sit on my hands and marvel at the winner's performance under Tom Bellamy, the way he pulled out more and more on the run-in underlining just how well this horse stays.

Still only seven and probably happiest on proper spring ground despite winning the Ultima on heavy, he should be a big player for Kim Bailey if he can get him back to Aintree in one piece next April.

Speaking of which, Chianti Classico’s fairly ready win off a BHA mark of 152 represented another boost to the form of the 2024 Mildmay Novices’ Chase. He was fourth to Inothewayurthinkin on Merseyside that day and third home Heart Wood had already put a bit of gloss on the race by winning Wexford’s Listed chase last Monday.

The six-year-old Inothewayurthinkin is among that next wave of very promising stayers, along with Fact To File, Spillane's Tower and I Am Maximus, who could all play their part in keeping the likes of Galopin Des Champs and Gerri Colombe on their toes throughout the next few months. You could throw in Corbetts Cross too, who was second to Heart Wood just the other day.

So while Paul Nicholls may have a bit of a quandary trying to find a suitable spot for a waning Bravemansgame and Gordon Elliott has been left scratching his head with his big Gold Cup hope, it's clear that for JP McManus’s race-planners the fun has barely begun.

Published at 1445 GMT on 04/11/24

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