After shorter races took centre stage on the opening days of the Cheltenham Festival, it is the endurance specialists who move into focus for the second half of the meeting, beginning with the Stayers’ Hurdle on Thursday.
The 3 mile contest will pocket the winner just under £200,000, which has gone to the connections of Flooring Porter for the last two years, and the 8-year-old is back again to attempt a hat-trick of victories.
The partnership remains the same with Danny Mullins aboard the Gavin Cromwell-trained gelding.
Form wise, Flooring Porter is difficult to read, he hasn’t won since last year’s renewal; second in the Liverpool Hurdle at Aintree in April before successive fourth places this season, both in Ireland on differing ground.
However, his previous win before the 2022 Stayers’ was the 2021 Stayers’. So backers should have no reason to doubt him based on a lack of recent success.
※ Current Odds Date & Time: March 15th, 9:00 A.M. (GMT)
Bookmakers do have some doubt, making him the 7.00 joint-third favourite alongside the horse who won those two Irish races, Home By The Lee.
Sixth in last year’s edition, the 8-year-old had gone over 18 months without a win before those two back-to-back, Navan’s Lismullen Hurdle and the Christmas Hurdle at Leopardstown, resulting in his first Grade 1 triumph.
JJ Slevin will take his usual ride for trainer Joseph O’Brien.
Wins have been in abundance for the 4.00 favourite, Blazing Khal, who won the Grade 2 Boyne Hurdle at Navan last month after 14 months on the sidelines, but that extended his winning streak to five for the father-and-son team of Charles and Philip Byrnes.
Two of those five, in late 2021, were in Grade 2 races at Cheltenham including the Albert Bartlett Novices Hurdle.
A close second favourite at 5.00 is Teahupoo for Gordon Elliott, who last time out took a 3 mile Grade 2 at Gowran Park in January. That was Davy Russell’s first ride on the 6-year-old and the two will be in tandem tomorrow.
Ninth in last year’s Champion Hurdle and last in the Irish equivalent in April, a move to the longer distances seems to be paying off with a Grade 1 success at Fairhouse over 2 miles 3 furlongs in December providing a great stepping stone.
Second to Teahupoo at Fairyhouse and the winner of last year’s Irish Stayers’, Klassical Dream at 10.00 is very much in the picture, while Gold Tweet (12.00) won over the course and distance in January.
Or could Paisley Park (17.00), having won the Long Walk Hurdle at Kempton, win this race for the second time, five years after first taking the title?
