THE CHELTENHAM FESTIVAL 
It has to be Willie Mullins all the way 
And so we’re all set for the greatest show on earth
Day one could be a Willie Mullins bonanza. So could day two and day three and day four, of course, but if the champion trainer is going to have a day of days, it will probably be Tuesday.
So how many of the Mullins favourites will win on day one? Douvan, Un De Sceaux, Faugheen, Annie Power? It is around 15/1 the accumulator at best prices if you fancy all four. And uniquely, such is the strength of Mullins' back-up team, three of the four hot ones could get beaten and he could still win all four races. Un De Sceaux in the Arkle is the only one who flies the Closutton flag on his own. He likes doing things out on his own I guess.
Bizarrely for the defending champ, Jezki is still a little bit of a forgotten horse in the Champion Hurdle. I suppose that’s going to happen if you go zero for three for the season.
But we know that Jezki is at his best on goodish ground – ref. Cheltenham last year, Punchestown last year. His three runs this season to date have been on soft ground, soft ground, and yielding ground respectively. He is getting closer to his optimum conditions. A similar performance to the one that he put in last year would bring him close.
However, given the shape of the race, Arctic Fire may be the bet each-way at 16/1 Third in of the Willie Mullins triumvirate, the Soldier Hollow gelding was beaten less than two lengths by Hurricane Fly and Jezki in the Ryanair Hurdle at Leopardstown’s Christmas Festival, and he split the pair of them in the Irish Champion Hurdle in January. Yet he is twice the price of Hurricane Fly and four times the price of Jezki.
So he will have to improve if he is going to get closer still, but there is every chance that he will. He is only six years old, he is a year younger than Jezki and Faugheen and The New One, and Hurricane Fly had won three Grade 1 races before he was born. Of the top five in the market, he is probably the one with most potential for further progression.
He ran a cracker to finish a close second in the County Hurdle last year as a five-year-old when, if the race had panned out a little differently for him, he might have won it. So County Hurdle form is handicap form, but that run proved that he can thrive under Cheltenham Festival conditions, and he should bounce off the ground.
The shape of the race is really good for each-way betting: a short priced favourite, the dead eight runners, and quarter the odds a place. Arctic Fire may not win, he may be quite good enough to beat all of Faugheen and Jezki and The New One and Hurricane Fly, but he probably shouldn’t be a 16/1 shot against them, and 4/1 about him finishing in the first three is well worth having as the place part of the bet.
Donn McClean