Sunday Selections & Updates Cheltenham Open Day 3 (Will the Pipe and Nicholls show continue today?) - 13 November

Will the Pipe and Nicholls show continue today ? Both have had a treble - Pipe on Friday and Nicholls on Saturday.  

Selections will going up one by one below  - meanwhile I think all the other runners in the Greatwood should be very afraid of the Mullins horse (purely because of it's name).  It wasn't disgraced - neuvième ( I think he may have been waiting for his minky to catch up!)

A couple of winners and a handful of places but a loss of -4.94....but a very pretty colourful table below!

	Cheltenham	First Choice	Danger
1	13:10	Astracad 2nd	Lancetto NR
2	13:45	Gauvain (3.1) 1st	Woolcombe Folly 2nd
3	14:20	Moon Dice 4th	Inspector Clouseau UP
4	14:55	Filbert PU	Joker Choker 4th
5	15:30	Fingal Bay (1.94) 1st	Polisky 3rd
6	16:00	Mont Bazon 3rd	Catch Tammy UP

Notes:

1/             Paul Nicholls makes a convincing case for Al Ferof needing this first run over fences and I have an aversion to backing first time chasers at Cheltenham.  Astracad would be better over further at any other track and that stamina will be well used up the hill. Lancetto could probably have done with it drying out a bit more.

2/             Gauvain dropping back in to more realistic company after flying high in group 1’s – won FTO last season.  Woolcombe Folly has been targeted for this.

3/             Moon Dice looks a class apart – only (tiny)question mark is the left handed track.  I think this may be too soon for Pateese after his Sandown win.  A Media Luz is a tad high in the weights for me.  Inspector Clouseau will have had to improve a lot in recent weeks but not beyond possibilities (and my daughter reminded me of the success of those names that have had a video or pic on blog – not exactly scientific though)!  Those four are my shortlist.

4/             A real lottery of a race – not much of my £££s being invester here but have gone against Rangitoto only for the reason that he looks as though he needs hard driving.  Filbert has Dickie Johnson booked which is a big plus here and the best of the outsiders IMO is Joker Choker who has been unlucky.   

5/             Fingal Bay has been so impressive that it’ll take an absolute star or something to go wrong for him to be beaten (IMO).  Polisky could probably do with more rain but should nick a place.

6/             Mont Bazon should take this but just in case he needs the run first time out this season, Catch Tammy is a decent enough price at 25/1 for an each way chance.  Would have won LTO but for being bumped and trainer bought him for 60K at the start of the month.

My Tote Top Ten To Follow Jumps Picks went in on Friday morning in the nick of time and are:

• Australia Day
• Crack Away Jack
• Cue Card
• Diamond Harry
• Menorah
• Mon Parrain
• Peddlers Cross
• Ski Sunday
• Soldatino
• Spirit Sun

The fact that 4 of these have recently run and didn't win is probably a fair indication of how we can expect these to perform - but I shall keep on telling myself that they each needed their first run of the season and that they are potentially huge improvers (think acorn and oak tree sort of improvement needed in some instances.....)