It’s now less than two weeks’ time before we’ll know our Gold Cup winner and the 2017 Cheltenham Festival will be a thing of the past.
We’re keeping things quiet before the opening Supreme Novices’ Hurdle on day one but can’t resist a poke at LE MERCUREY tomorrow at Kelso.
Paul Nicholls’s chaser has been in good form this season and has twice beaten the 166-rated Bristol De Mai in the last year – most recently when a fine second in the Denman Chase behind Gold Cup second-favourite Native River.
Despite the unimpressive winning time in that race, such form makes a mockery of his 151 rating and he looks a nice price at 2/1 to get the better of the thoroughly-exposed Tenor Nivernais.
That horse has shot up the weights as a ten-year-old after bolting up in a fairly lukewarm renewal of an Ascot handicap a fortnight ago, so there’s more than enough doubt about his credentials to take him on.
Aged seven, Le Mercurey is the younger horse and has had a full three weeks to get over his Newbury assignment, while his opponent’s older legs have had just the two since Ascot.
At the prices it’s an obvious bet.
1.5pt win Le Mercurey @2/1, 16:00 Kelso, Saturday
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