Penworthy

All-weather racing is usually not for me: it too often serves up poor quality fare featuring either horses past their prime or horses who are simply never going to have a prime worth mentioning. However, the one all-weather race that I do study in depth each year is the Jenningsbet Northumberland Plate and that is because, with prize money of more than £80,000 for the winner, it attracts entries

Lambourn trainer Dominic Ffrench Davis has started the Flat season in fine form with nine winners from just 37 runners for a winning per cent to races of 24 per cent. This year he has undoubtedly benefitted from an influx of more than 20 horses from high-spending owners, Amo Racing, but he is a trainer

Master trainer Aidan O’Brien provides a quandary for punters by sending over two very different horses from Ireland to contest tomorrow’s Qipco 2000 Guineas Stakes. Little Big Bear is officially the highest rated horse in the race (Newmarket 4.40 p.m.) after four impressive wins last season but he has never raced over further than six

The bet365 Gold Cup, that’s the former Whitbread Gold Cup, remains one of my favourite big race handicaps of the jumps season and I am pleased to say that I have a good tipping record in the race. A quick, slick jumper who stays well is required as the fences come thick and fast on

Scottish trainer Lucinda Russell has her string in such fine form that she might win a race at Ayr this weekend if she entered the stable cat. From her five runners at Aintree last weekend, she ended up with two wins, two seconds and a sixth – quite an achievement. Pride of place went, of

My late father, who was the kindest man I have ever encountered, introduced me to horse racing when I was a small boy. Although he died all of 33 years ago, I still remember his advice to me when betting on the world’s most famous horse race: ‘The best form for the Grand National is…

The new flat season and the Pertemps Network Lincoln at Doncaster (tomorrow 3.35 p.m.) will dominate the racing pages this weekend, and rightly so. The bookmakers have the correct horses at the head of the market for the Lincoln: two improving four-year-olds, Al Mubhir and Awaal, but both at cramped odds. I largely stay clear

One of the keys to successful ante-post betting it to choose horses whose trainers are skilled at targeting big races. If you lead a horse to the well too many times, the well will eventually run dry. The trainers who pick up the biggest prizes season after season know that they can only get any

If it feels like this column is appearing far more regularly than usual, that’s because it is. Normally a Friday-only offering, there have been four daily previews for the Cheltenham Festival and now this one to make it five columns in as many days. It’s been tough going finding winners this week but we got

Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup day is almost upon us and the rain-softened ground means the distance of 3 miles 2 furlongs plus will not be for the faint of heart or for those horses whose stamina is in doubt. In the Grade 1 feature race tomorrow (3.30pm), the favourite Galopin Des Champs oozes class but

The rain continues to fall at Cheltenham and so it is vital to look for horses that like soft ground on day three of the Festival tomorrow. Equine talent that needs the ground similar to the terrain of the M25 to show their best form might as well stay in their stables. One horse that

Few people enjoy the thrill of a winning punt more than me but there are times when betting becomes (almost) irrelevant. Tomorrow at 3.30 p.m. will be one of them. That’s when seven runners will line up for the Unibet Champion Hurdle, the first championship race of this week’s four-day Cheltenham Festival. I will be

With the start of the Cheltenham Festival just four days away, I am pleased to say that this column’s antepost book for the meeting is looking decidedly healthy. It can all go badly wrong, of course, over the space of four days but, for now at least, let’s live in hope. Over the past couple

Trainer Sandy Thomson has long had a knack of improving experienced horses that are moved to his yard. A combination of the healthy Scottish Borders air and a new regime have done wonders for several veteran chasers over the years, including Harry The Viking, Yorkhill and Dingo Dollar. The secret? ‘Individual care. It’s all about

If there is one trainer I think might have a memorable Cheltenham for the ‘home team’ in the face of stiff competition from Ireland, it is Harry Fry. The Dorset handler looks as if he has kept some of his best horses fresh and well with the hope of landing a couple of big prizes

Friends Oliver Greenall and Josh Guerriero have made a flying start to their new training partnership this season. Both names are on the licence but they have different roles: Greenall is the face of the duo at the racetrack, entertaining owners including several from the many syndicates that are linked to the yard, while Guerriero

I make no apologies for the fact that over the next month I will spend a lot of time looking forward to what I regard as Britain’s finest annual sporting event: the Cheltenham Festival. Yes, there will be groans from racegoers that Guinness is a rip-off at £7.50 a pint; yes, it can get overcrowded

One of the nicest parts about writing this weekly column for Spectator Life is the informed comments that greet it each week from readers. I am thinking specifically about people such as ‘Simian Leer’, ‘Oswald Grimes’ and ‘Simon’. This week my thanks go to ‘Simian’, who in late December highlighted the chances of NASSALAM in

Many of my best bets over the years have been placed after watching replays of past races, looking out for horses that fared well despite bad luck in running. I have rewatched last year’s Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir Challenge Cup Handicap Chase several times and there is no doubt that MISTER COFFEY was a desperately