Cheltenham
11.30pm
Butte Montana
He clearly has a mountain to climb if you judge him solely on his hurdling debut at Aintree last time but we know he is a lot better than that. His bumper form on heavy ground here last season shows you he has an engine, all right. Hopefully, he would have learned a lot from Aintree, and he will be more polished here.
12.40pm
Benny’s Bridge
I didn’t ride him but I thought he shaped a bit better than the beaten distance would suggest when sixth behind Tegerek here in October, and the handicapper played ball by dropping him 3lb. That now puts him on a fair mark if he can return to the form of his win here last season, and he has a decent shot at a third course victory. This handicap looks like it will take plenty of winning though, and he does need to show us a bit more here.
1.15pm
Agent Valdez
She went into overdrive up the straight at Leicester last week, and ended up running out a wide-margin winner. You can’t get too carried away with the form as only two finished and she has a 7lb penalty here, but she is certainly well handicapped on a strict interpretation of that win, and it isn’t hard to see her going very well again here. The relatively quick turnaround is an obvious concern, but she wouldn’t be running here if we felt she wasn’t fit and well after the Leicester win. I think she will go very close to following up.
3.35pm
Goodbye Dancer
He just hasn’t fired in three runs this season and is 2lb out of the handicap, so his chance of repeating his victory in this race last year is certainly not obvious. But if he can return to the form of that win here last season, and more importantly the race he was about to run when coming down at the last on New Year’s Day off a much higher mark than this, then he is certainly handicapped to take a big hand. Clearly, he has to plenty to prove after his recent runs but maybe easier ground will help him, so any rain would be welcome, and he isn’t out of this.
