Ross Clarke’s Festival Betting Guide

All eyes will be on Altior as he bids to extend his unbeaten run to 18 races and retain his Champion Chase crown.

It is impossible to look past Nicky Henderson’s superstar chaser, who is likely to start long odds-on, but anyone wanting to go in heavily on Altior might want to note that apart from Master Minded in 2009, the past 13 Champion Chase winners who tried to defend their title have been beaten.

A more interesting race from the perspective of the statistics is the RSA Chase, with 40 of the past 44 winners having finished first or second in their previous start, which counts against the Henderson-trained Santini, who finished third at Kempton back in December.

Ten of the past 12 winners of the RSA had also run at the previous Cheltenham Festival, while seven-yearolds have won 15 of the past 18 runnings.

With hot favourite Delta Work aged six, the only leading contender to match all the criteria is the Paul Nicholls-trained Topofthegame, and he rates as a standout bet on the trends.

If you are a fan of Champ, the favourite in the other Grade One race on the card, the Ballymore Novices’ Hurdle, you may want to stop reading now.

The seven-year-old won the Challow Hurdle in extremely impressive fashion on his last start, but all 16 winners of that contest to run in the Ballymore have been beaten, so it may pay to focus on his market rivals, given that 31 of the past 33 winners of the race have come from the first six in the market, with 14 of the past 20 winners having already won at grade level.

Those statistics suggest that Battleoverdoyen and Beakstown should run particularly well.

For those looking for a quirky angle, horses wearing hoods have been placed in the past four Fred Winter Hurdles, with French-bred runners also performing well.

Only one horse happens to be wearing a hood in this year’s race and he also happens to have been bred in France.

Torpillo is around 25-1 and could go well, especially if Cheltenham’s ground conditions remain soft.