IT’S PAI DAY
Super stayer Park still has the legs to go fourth
PAISLEY PARK gets the vote to make history with a fourth success in the Mccoy Contractors Cleeve Hurdle (3.35) at Cheltenham this afternoon.
Emma Lavelle’s staying legend has won the Grade 2 three-miler three times, an achievement on a par with Lady Rebecca’s hattrick of victories between 1999 and 2001.
He’s now 12 but Paisley Park is still capable of mixing it with the best grinders around. At the start of December, he failed by a head to concede 6lb to Dashel Drasher in the Grade 2 Long Distance Hurdle at Newbury.
And two days before Christmas, he agonisingly went under by a short head to Crambo when bidding to capture the top-level Long Walk Hurdle at Ascot for a fourth time.
A reproduction of either effort today will make Tom Bellamy’s mount very hard to beat.
It’s hard to see past JONBON in the Grade 1 My Pension Expert Clarence House
Chase (2.25).
The Cheltenham
Festival has been the scene of Jonbon’s only two career defeats and the absence of El Fabiolo, now bound for next weekend’s Dublin Racing Festival, clears his path to a sixth Grade 1 triumph.
Despite her nine-month absence from the racecourse, LOSSIEMOUTH should land the
Grade 2 Unibet Hurdle (3.00). Willie Mullins’ mare lifted Cheltenham’s Triumph Hurdle and the Champion Four Year Old Hurdle at Punchestown in the spring to establish herself as the top juvenile over timber, and Paul Townend’s mount still has plenty more to offer.
The Paddy Power Cheltenham Countdown Podcast Handicap Chase (1.15) looks open, but GA LAW returns to two and a half miles after failing to get home in the Coral Gold Cup at Newbury eight weeks ago and is capable of giving a good account.
At Doncaster, FORWARD PLAN can continue his upward curve in the SBK Great Yorkshire Handicap Chase (3.15).
A three-time scorer last season, including two wins over fences, the eight-year-old saddled by Anthony Honeyball (left) was back in business over course and distance last time out with a length-and-a-half beating of Mister Coffey.
Forward Plan has had just seven attempts over the larger obstacles and isn’t done with yet.
Lossiemouth’s stablemate GALA MARCEAU is preferred to another Mullins runner, Ashroe Diamond, in the Grade 2 SBK Yorkshire Rose Mares’ Hurdle (2.05). DESTROYTHEEVIDENCE is expected to go well in the Grade 2 Albert Bartlett River Don Novices’ Hurdle (2.40).