Ruby Walsh could see Fact To File being re-routed to the Ryanair Chase at Cheltenham.
He was speaking on Paddy Power Media’s ‘From The Horse’s Mouth’ podcast ‘Cheltenham Countdown’, alongside host Tom Nugent and Rory Delargy.
Willie Mullins' charge made a winning reappearance in the John Durkan Memorial Punchestown Chase but Galopin Des Champs comprehensively reversed the form when they met again in the Savills Gold Cup at Christmas.
The pair are set to lock horns for a third time in the Paddy Power Irish Gold Cup at the Dublin Racing Festival and unless the younger horse can lay a glove on his rival this time, Walsh feels a drop in trip is in the offing in March.
"I suppose going to Leopardstown looking at the bigger picture, I kind of had a feeling that if Fact To File doesn’t win here, whatever way you looked at it Galopin Des Champs was going to go from Leopardstown to Leopardstown to the Gold Cup, but a huge amount hinged on how Fact To File got on as to where he was going to go or where he’d end up," he explained.
"Now I do believe that he’s still going to run at the DRF and that will determine ultimately where he ends up in March, but if Galopin Des Champs beats him again comprehensively at the Dublin Racing Festival, I could see Fact To File in the Ryanair absolutely.
"I mean you’d take on Galopin Des Champs twice at three miles in Leopardstown and if you can’t beat him, how do you think you can beat him over three and a quarter? There’s no logic to that so I do think Fact To File could end up here providing on what happens at the DRF and leaving Leopardstown at Christmas, do I think Fact To File will turn it around?
"I probably don’t. I think he raced back to front – I thought in the parade ring before the race he was so tense even going to the start early in the race, he didn’t race like a horse, I don’t know is he mentally ready for a Gold Cup yet?
"He doesn’t race like a long-distance chaser – he doesn’t settle, he doesn’t switch off, he’s not behind the bridle, he was to me way too pent up and he didn’t even jump as well as he can.
"He didn’t spend a year novice hurdling – he went straight from bumpers to novice chasing so in essence, he’s into a Gold Cup even though his age doesn’t suggest it, for his experience he’s into a Gold Cup with quite little experience.
"If he wins [at Leopardstown in February], he goes Gold Cup, he’ll need a valid excuse [if he finishes a good second] if he stands on his head at the last like he was going to win and gets beaten, yes.
"Possibly and what way they ride him as well, what do you do to settle him. There’s two ways of settling a horse, you go forward or you go back so do you go forward, do you buck out at Leopardstown say ‘come on Galopin Des Champs, I’m going this gallop, are you coming with me?’
"Or do you go back to the back of the field and leave Galopin Des Champs in front, that’ll be up to Mark Walsh and their team as to what they decide to do. But there’s two ways to going about it as well, but I think what happens at the DRF will determine where he goes, in all likelihood that’s probably the Ryanair, but I’d say that’s already factored into the price is it?"
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