Love the Jumps

  Cheltenham's two day Showcase meeting took centre stage this weekend, with racing from national hunts HQ starting on the Friday. here are a few stand out performances from the two days, firstly Galvin who took the 3m novice chase for Gordon Elliot and Robbie Power, he was a bit dubious with some of his early jumping but as the race progressed he found his rhythm and won impressively by 7 lengths. After he was installed as the favourite for the National Hunt Chase back at Cheltenham come March, hard to put anyone off but its a bit soon to be backing one for that race just now. The standout performance of the day went to Rouge Vif who won as easy as he liked, he travelled and jumped superbly taking up the lead with 4 to jump before putting in an inch perfect jump at the last before being eased down to win by 7 lengths. This performance saw him being quoted for the Champion Chase at 16/1, yes it was an impressive run, but I'd like to see him do it in graded company as he would

  With Chepstow's two day meeting having just gone, this is now the time that the National Hunt racing starts to take centre stage. The meeting started with a winner for Paul Nicholls with Thyme White winning easily, he was the first of 8 winners across the two days for the former Champion trainer. The main event on Chepstow's race card was the Persian War Novices hurdle, once again going the way of team Ditcheat with McFabulous winning impressively and also getting my 10 to follow off to a flying start. He travelled and jumped well throughout the race beating Courtandbould buy 3 lengths but never had to be asked for his effort by Cobden, bookies have already cut him in price from 33/1 to 14s for the Stayers hurdle at Cheltenham come March, I'd like to see him out of novice company first before getting ahead of myself but he does look like he could be a potential star over the staying distances. The best finish at Chepstow on the Friday came in the veterans chase, with t

  With what many see as the official start of the jumps season starting at Chepstow on Friday, now seems like the perfect time to have a sit down and pick out a few horses to follow this season. this year I have the added assistance of a couple of people to pick out a few horses each to follow. Hopefully the horses that are provided below can have a successful season and go onto big things. same as last year you can click on the horses name where it will take you to their Racing Post profile where you can add them to your tracker. Saint Sonnet (Paul Nicholls)   He arrived at Ditcheat from France where he made 8 starts winning 3 times over hurdles as well as winning his only start over fences. We didn't see him make his debut for Paul till late on in the season, he did this in late February at Catterick, he was sent off a short priced favourite and justified this winning easily in the end by nearly 4 lengths. Two weeks later he was running at Cheltenham in the Marsh Novices Chase, h