With the next staging of the Cheltenham Festival just around the corner, punters are beginning to make final decisions regarding their picks for the four-day meeting. While there are 28 races scheduled between March 10 and March 13, a feature race takes centre stage on each day, the last of which is the Cheltenham Gold Cup on the Friday. However, we are sure that you will be looking for value throughout the event, starting with Tuesday's action which sees the Champion Hurdle act as the showcase race.
As with most of your Cheltenham festival betting, you are going to get attractive ante-post odds, and the horse which sticks out for us for the Champion Hurdle is Sharjah. The French-bred horse had little luck in this race 12 months ago, being brought down while in contention heading into the third-last fence. On that occasion, it went off at 20/1, and although 12/1 is considerably shortly this time around, it should fare better after last year's experience. Silver Streak is also one to watch at 25/1 after finishing in third position in 2019. While it was never threatening the front two, that was courtesy of being held up at the rear for the majority of the race. Again, like with Sharjah, lessons will have been learned.
When considering your bets for the Queen Mother Champion Chase on the second day of the festival, you will see that it could turn out to be a three-way battle between Altior, Defi Du Seuil and Chacun Pour Soi. At the festival gets closer, we expect the purists to start placing large sums on Altior as he bids for a fifth successive victory at this meeting. Having suffered his first defeat late last year and having recently overcome an injury, it may be worth considering one of its rivals, although the flipside to that argument is that you will most likely never get 2/1 - the current price - on this legendary horse ever again. From an outsiders perspective, we like Politologue at 20/1, who finished as runner-up to Altior 12 months ago. Although he did not fare great on his last outing in December, it was only his second race back from wind surgery, and he should be better for the extra preparation.
Moving onto Thursday and the Stayers Chase, it could be all about Paisley Park, who is the heavy favourite at 8/13. All things considered, it is probably too low for most punters, and we instead fancy Penhill. The nine-year-old - a two-time winner at this meeting - spent over a year-and-a-half on the sidelines until returning in December 2019, but progress has been made in each of his four races over a 10-week period. With two second places to his name in his most recent appearances, we cannot ignore the 14/1 which is currently on offer.
Friday, March 13 is Gold Cup day, and there are going to be several runners which take your interest. For us, though, it has to be Santini, the eight-year-old trained by Nicky Henderson who has finished in the top three in each of his four previous runs at Cheltenham. In coming second in last year's Novices' Chase, Santini lost a shoe during the race, a scenario which highlights the strengthen and ability of this horse. Although 7/2 may not be big enough for some punters, it is a no-brainer when it comes to multiple bets, especially each-way.
