It’s that time of the season when the attentions turn towards the jumps season.
It’s getting colder and darker so while digging out the winter clothing for the foreseeable it is worth trying to find some jumps horses to follow at all levels of the wonderful game.
A bit of rain in autumn could see the better horses out a little earlier than expected on both sides of the Irish Sea.
Two promising Dan Skelton horses in Fortune De Mer and Be Aware were given entries for Newton Abbot tomorrow and Willie Mullins has said that some of his better horses could be out earlier than usual thanks to the weather playing ball.
Mind you, Davy Crockett maintained his unbeaten start to his career at the Listowel Harvest Festival this season, earning a 12-1 quote for March’s Supreme Novices’ Hurdle for the Cheltenham Festival – apologies for using the ‘C word’ already.
He’s a nice type, a brother of Annie Power, trained by Mullins and owned by JP McManus. Quotes of 12-1 are entirely laughable at this absurdly early stage of the season.
Constitution Hill is a jumps horse that has a wide following but he’s not on my punting radar
Trainer Nicky Henderson gave a positive update about his star but we’ve seen false dawns before
The Seven Barrows handler works some of his string at his base as the jumps season starts soon
We haven’t seen anything else of significance jump a twig in anger. It’s like taking the opening offer after the first round of Deal Or No Deal. It’s very rarely a prudent strategy.
It’s not even October yet and we’ve had our first update from Nicky Henderson on Constitution Hill. He’s gone to the equine equivalent of Specsavers, apparently. They’ve found nothing. But he’s typically well with him himself. But the big takeaway is he hasn’t been schooled over a hurdle yet.
In my mind, he’ll have it all to prove until seen on a racetrack again. The target is the Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle. Henderson insists he’s further forward than he was last year when missing the engagement. In the world of sceptical punting, it’s a case of waiting and seeing.
This rhetoric only serves for bookmakers to cutting an already skimpy price for main events come spring time and it all rather dampens the enthusiasm for the season ahead. We’ve already seen it with Kopek Des Bordes, fairly well-known he’s go chasing for anyone willing to pay attention.
One social-media update later and another couple of points are trimmed off his price. Rinse and repeat.
But the familiar horses at the top of the markets for the big Grade One races are all horses we pretty much know everything about: Galopin Des Champs, Constitution Hill, Fact To File, Teahupoo, Lossiemouth, Marine Nationale and Inothewayurthinkin.
All have won at Cheltenham and a good few will probably go in again. But they are all either obvious, short or both.
They will all suffer some sort of setback, too. One may have an injury, a rival may improve past them or they might be beaten in a race earlier in the season.
Impaire Et Passe has much to recommend him and is a nice price for his likely major targets
Any of these three things, amid others, will probably see the majority of these horses be a bigger price at some stage of the season. It’s worth bearing in mind if you want to keep them on side in some shape or form.
The best course of action while looking at these markets is digging deeper and finding very good horses forgotten about for one reason only – they didn’t run at Cheltenham last year.
They are invariably forgotten about and overpriced in relation to everything else and usually have hidden depth of potential.
Step forward IMPAIRE ET PASSE who is 66-1 for the Gold Cup (Sky Bet), 20-1 for the Ryanair Chase (Paddy Power) and 25-1 for the King George (bet365).
This is a high-class horse trained by Mullins who did not run at the Festival because the Turners Novices’ Chase was turned into a handicap.
He was the Ballymore Novices’ Hurdle winner in 2023 when thrashing Gaelic Warrior by six-and-a-half lengths in one of the most impressive novice hurdling displays seen at the Festival in the last decade or so,
The performance was so good for a five-year-old, Team Mullins thought it worthwhile in trying to make him a Champion Hurdle horse. It never quite worked out but showed his Grade One ability when winning the Aintree Hurdle over two and a half miles in 2024 and helped seal the British trainers’ title for Mullins in taking out the Grade Two Select Hurdle at Sandown over a furlong further.
His chasing debut started at Fairyhouse over two miles five furlongs, an indicator that for all Impaire Et Passe’s perceived pace he’s developing into a stayer.
Impaire Et Passe boasts high-class novice hurdling and chasing form that could translate well
He won the Grade One novice chase at Limerick in emphatic fashion. Subsequently, the Ladbrokes Novices’ Chase at Leopardstown didn’t go to plan.
However, interestingly enough, Imparie Et Passe has won 10 of his 15 races but is zero from three at Leopardstown. Perhaps it’s a racecourse that he simply doesn’t like and it looked like that when third last year to Ballyburn in February where he didn’t have a cut at his fences.
This theory may help formulate a plan for the seven-year-old going on eight, pretty much the peak years of a jumps horse, for the season ahead. More on that later.
With the designated race for him at Cheltenham gone, Impaire Et Passe once again won at Aintree, the fifth Grade One in his career, in beating Arkle winner Jango Baie and Gidleigh Park by a cosy length and a half.
He was unlucky when stepped up to three miles at Punchestown when brought down by stablemate Lecky Watson falling in front of him at the sixth fence. He was sent off 11-4 that day, while Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase winner Lecky Watson 9-2. Ballyburn was favourite but his jumping has gone to pot recently.
There must have been a distinct possibility of Impaire Et Passe being capable of beating the winner, 22-1 Champ Kiely, who was another Mullins runner. It was a typically messy end-of-season G1 at Punchestown and one that Impaire Et Passe may have left on the floor through no fault of his own.
But the reward for that is a bigger price than expected in a high-class novice chasing graduate rated 158 over fences and 163 over hurdles in pretty much every race he could possibly run in; the King George, Ryanair and Gold Cup. A minor financial interest in all three can get the blood flowing for the jumps season ahead.
The theory of him disliking Leopardstown should see an obvious campaigning route; the John Durkan Chase at Punchestown as a starting point, the King George on Boxing Day at Kempton, either the Ryanair or Gold Cup at Cheltenham and skipping Leopardstown in February should allow Impaire Et Passe to take in at least one of Aintree or Punchestown at the end of the campaign.
Willlie Mullins has more obvious stars such as Galopin Des Champs that are short in the market
Yes, he has a bit to find with the established players at the top of the markets but the potential is there. The price is definitely there. And that’s what appeals to punters in the long run.
Impaire Et Passe is the undoubted high-class jumps horse to keep a beady eye on this season.
PERFORMANCE OF THE WEEK…
Plenty of contenders at Newmarket’s Future Champions meeting. Bow Echo travelled stylishly in the Royal Lodge, while True Love bounced back to her best form in the Cheveley Park Stakes. Both are bright prospects going forward.
However, the performance from WISE APPROACH to win the Middle Park was something out of the ordinary. Yes, he had the best form coming into it but his half-length victory had to be done the hard way.
Wise Approach (royal blue) won the Middle Park Stakes with a remarkable performance
He was slow out the stalls, stumbled and was stone-dead last. He also had to come to the middle of the track and circle the whole field to mount his challenge and had enough in the locker to repel the challenge of Brussels and Coppull, both had far smoother runs than the winner.
His finishing speed suggests that he’s more of a Commonwealth Cup type than a Guineas one for next season. He could be a formidable force in the sprint division next season.
