I was thinking at the start of the week that if Quel Esprit could go and beat Synchronised in Sunday’s Hennessy Gold Cup (note that the Cognac bit has been absent since 2010, in much the same way as they dropped the Diamond bit from Ascot’s King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, although maybe that one had more to do with De Beers withdrawing their sponsorship of the race than it had to do with any shift in branding) at Leopardstown, then he would be a lot shorter than the 25/1 that is currently available about him for the Cheltenham Gold Cup.
Here’s the science bit. Synchronised was and is as short as 10/1 for the Gold Cup. Regardless of whether or not you think that that is a fair assessment of his chance, it is a fact. So if Quel Esprit could beat JP McManus’s horse over the course and distance over which he put up a career-best performance in landing the Lexus Chase in December, then that would make him a serious Gold Cup candidate. They would have to put him in at around the same price as Synchronised is now, as long as he beat him on merit and as long as Synchronised was well going into the race. Possibly shorter, given that he has more scope for progression than the 2010 Welsh National winner (confusingly run in 2011).
I thought there was a big chance that Quel Esprit would beat Synchronised too. I’m still convinced that the Lexus that Synchronised won, under a superb ride from AP McCoy, was a weak Lexus. The ground wasn’t soft enough for Rubi Light, and Quito De La Roque probaby didn’t run his race. The Down Royal race probably took an awful lot out of him, he may not have had time to recover, and, actually, we may not see him back to his best until next season now. The ground should have been faster than ideal for Synchronised as well, and the distance was surely shorter than ideal.
Fair play to connections, they spotted an opportunity and they took their chance, and neither Jonjo O’Neill nor JP McManus were unduly pessimistic in the lead up to the race, but the time was really poor, over three seconds slower than the time that Last Instalment clocked in winning the novices’ race run over the same course and distance an hour earlier, and even Last Instalment’s time was not out of this world.
So with my beating-the-market hat on, I was thinking, take the 25/1 about Quel Esprit for the Gold Cup now. At worst, you could have a fine trading position after Sunday’s race.
Then I thought some more. Rarely a good thing, but sometimes unavoidable. I have reservations about Quel Esprit for the Gold Cup. He is not proven over an extended three and a quarter miles, and he may not really be a Cheltenham horse. In three runs there, he has fallen in a Neptune Hurdle, finished sixth in an Albert Bartlett Hurdle and fallen in an RSA Chase.
Okay, so you can easily forgive him his Albert Bartlett run, as it was just two days after he had fallen in the Neptune, for all that he fell early on in that Neptune, and he was travelling well in front when he fell in the RSA Chase last year. However, he may just not be in love with the place now, he may not have happy memories of it. At best, he is unproven at the track. Better, I thought, to back him at 4/1 to win Sunday’s race than to back him at 25/1 to win the Gold Cup, even if you were going to be able to trade out of that position at 10/1 or 12/1 after Sunday’s race.
Then Synchronised was scratched, the cornerstone of that line of thinking was snatched away, falling down like that house of cards that you built in a hurry while your dad was calling you for your dinner.
There are still angles to Sunday’s race, mind you. Quel Esprit is probably not a bet now at 5/4 or even money. He is an exciting talent, and the small field should suit him, but I would still prefer to have backed him at 4/1 with Synchronised and Jessies Dream and Quito De La Roque in the race than at even money or 5/4 with them out of the race, if that makes sense.
China Rock is interesting, he was Sizing Europe’s almost-equal over Sunday’s trip a season and a half ago, and he shaped nicely on his debut this season over hurdles at Punchestown last month on his first run since he was pulled up in last year’s Gold Cup. However, being by Presenting and all, he would probably prefer better ground than the ground he is likely to encounter on Sunday.
Magnanimity is also interesting, he was only beaten a head by Bostons Angel in the Dr PJ Moriarty Chase on this card last year, he was only a length behind him in the RSA Chase, and he is another who shaped promisingly on his only run to date this term, until the second last fence in the Lexus.
However, Bostons Angel is even more interesting. He is a continually under-rated horse. Triple Grade 1 winner last year, winner of three of the top staying races on the calendar for novice chasers (Quel Esprit was a faller in two of them), he unseated his rider when he was in front of, and travelling better than, ultimate winner Quito De La Roque in the JNwine.com Chase at Down Royal in November, and you can just put a line through his only other run this term at Sandown, where ground, track, tactics and random variables all conspired against him.
Jessica Harrington’s horses are bouncing again now after a slight mid-season lull, and it is interesting that she is fitting cheekpieces to Bostons Angel’s head for Sunday, just to help him concentrate. Robbie Power said that he didn’t do a tap for him at Sandown, that he wouldn’t have blown a candle out afterwards. (As in, if you had put a lit candle in front of him in the unsaddling enclosure, he wouldn’t have blown it out, so easily was he breathing.)
Also, he is back at Leopardstown, a track at which he has won a Fort Leney Chase and a Dr PJ Moriarty Chase from two attempts over fences, and at which he has finished third in a bumper at 20/1 on his only other visit. He may not be able to achieve what he achieved last year – three Grade 1 wins sets the bar fairly high – and it may well be that last year’s bunch of novice chasers was not a vintage one, but it may also be that he will progress again now. The 12/1s and 14/1s that were available before the mass exodus from Sunday’s race began may be gone, but the 4/1 at which you can back him now, given the current opposition, is more than fair.
And looking further ahead, he is proven at the Cheltenham Festival, he is an RSA Chase winner, so the 40/1 at which you can back him now for the Gold Cup is just not the worst idea in the world.
