Nicky Henderson: “This should hopefully put him spot on for Cheltenham…”

A very quiet weekend for us, with just one runner at Ascot, but this is pretty much the norm at this stage of the season when all of the Cheltenham horses have had their final preps before the Festival and it’s just a case of looking after them all and hoping and praying nothing goes wrong between now and then – which will be a miracle if that happens!

I was very impressed with Iberico Lord at Newbury last week, and it appears so was the Handicapper who put him up 9lbs to a revised mark of 143. The County Hurdle would seem the logical race for him and we know he handles the track as his victory in the Unibet Greatwood Hurdle will testify. I think ground is key to him, which is why he underperformed at Ascot prior to Newbury, so any cut in the ground is most definitely in his favour.

Doddiethegreat ran a fine race to finish fourth, but quite simply wants further, which brings us into the Coral Cup and that race looks ideal. He’s been left on 132 and could still be quite competitive off that mark, with the step up in trip hopefully bringing out more improvement as well.

Shishkin did what we hoped he would in the Denman which was great to see and that will have put him ready for the Gold Cup. We’ll see what L’Homme Presse does at Ascot this weekend, but the race is starting to have a very nice look to it and while Galopin Des Champs was good at Leopardstown, the home team certainly won’t make it easy for him.

As I say, just one runner at Ascot on Saturday and my thoughts on the sole Seven Barrows runner of the day can be found below.

ASCOT

2:25

Hyland (Nico de Boinville)

He’s been a very consistent person all the way through and has developed into a very smart horse. This trip is probably on the short side, but the ground is going to be quite testing, although not ideal for a horse like him, and the main objective is to end up in the Pertemps, so this should hopefully put him spot on for Cheltenham, where he won earlier in the season.

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