Kelso Saturday

CRACKING Rhapsody (Ewan Whillans) was relatively unfancied for the Morebattle Hurdle, despite winning the race last year, with the consensus being that he might struggle in a deeper race, having gone up almost a stone in the interim. That fear proved unfounded, however, as Craig Nichol brought the 12/1 chance with a perfectly timed run to lead after the last hurdle to beat Alnilam (Olly Murphy/Sean Quinlan) and Old Gregorian by a length and a quarter and the same.

The race threw up a concern for the Jonjo O’Neill stable, however, with both his runners, Tellherthename and Wilful pulled up, despite coming in for strong support in a race run at a furious gallop. Cracking Rhapsody could bid for the sponsor’s £100k bonus in the County Hurdle, where he would have a 5lb penalty.

Regarding that Cheltenham bid, Whillans said: “We put him in and we said if he wins or he’s just beaten, we might go. It’s not far home from Kelso, so he’ll be back in his box by 5pm.

“We’ll definitely look at it. The Scottish Champion Hurdle [third last year] would be a nice race, but we’re mindful the ground might dry up at Ayr at the time of year.”

Dawning back to his best

Grey Dawning (Dan/Harry Skelton) bounced back from his King George flop, with a fluent all-the-way success in Saturday’s Bet365 Premier Chase at Kelso, the feature race on the card’s richest day of the season.

Second in a gruelling Betfair Chase at Haydock, the grey seemed to be feeling those exertions at Kempton, but he was back to his brilliant best here, jumping as well as he ever has and always having enough to keep the chasing Iroko (Oliver Greenall and Josh Guerriero/Jonjo O’Neill Jr) at bay, with that horse his sole challenger after the departure of El Elefante.

Iroko looked in good form himself, but found the 5/6 favourite at the top of his game and in no mood to be passed. The winning margin was two and a half lengths.

“He jumped unbelievably well,” the winning rider told ITV Racing. “I think he’s happier on this ground. We always felt very testing ground doesn’t really suit him.

“As a jockey, all you can ask for is what he gave me round there. He jumped brilliantly and was a great ride. We’re back.”

“He’ll go to Aintree now,” said Dan Skelton, having echoed his brother’s comments. “We’d love to have a go at the Gold Cup in the future; I know we haven’t gone down that route this year, but we just felt this was the right thing to do for the horse and now we’ll have a really good competitor for Aintree.

“Hopefully, we can put on a good show there.

“If he goes to Aintree and does very well and next autumn we get to Haydock and it isn’t as soft, we can have a better start to the year and then we’d be all systems go for a Gold Cup.”

Doncaster Saturday

AT Doncaster, there was a shock in the Grimthorpe Gold Cup, as 2023 winner Moroder (Seamus Mullins/James Best) repeated that feat, having been out of sorts. The refitting of blinkers may have been the key for the 11-year-old, who failed to beat a rival in two runs in the autumn, but ran well when blinkers were first tried at Cheltenham last April.

Back from a break after his fruitless efforts earlier in the season, Moroder showed all his old dash to win at 33/1 in the familiar colours of nonagenarian owner Ann Leftley. Seamus Mullins aims to have another crack at the Bet365 Gold Cup with Moroder, a race he was placed in two years ago after winning the Grimthorpe.

“It’s a good fillip for the yard, as we’ve had an in-and-out season,” said Mullins. “But they’re coming back to form now. He’s a spring horse, who has been crying out for that ground, as he bounces off it. It’s just nice to come back and do it again. I’d like to thank the Horse Welfare Board, as he went on the schooling day at Larkhill around four weeks ago and was well-prepared at home.”

Cross-card treble for Irish stables

World Of Fortunes put her proven stamina to use in the Listed Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle at Doncaster. Liam Kenny’s charge was a staying-on sixth to Final Demand at the Dublin Racing Festival a month ago and benefitted from the longer trip to justify favouritism at 6/5 under Brian Hughes.

At Southwell’s all-weather fixture, there were wins for Michael O’Callaghan and Tara Cogan, with O’Callaghan’s Michael Scofield (Kieran Shoemark) winning the one-mile novice contest and Cogan taking a division of the seven-furlong handicap with Golden Goose (Rossa Ryan).

BOOSTER Bob (Olly Murphy) was a remarkable winner of the BetVictor Greatwood Gold Cup Handicap Chase at Newbury on Saturday, with the horse’s chance looking hopeless at an early stage, but despite being reluctant to exert himself in the first half of the race, he gave Sean Bowen another chance to show why he is the best jockey riding in the UK at the current time.

Bowen earned “ride of the season” plaudits for coaxing Moon d’Orange home at Cheltenham on Trials Day in similar circumstances and now has another one for the mantelpiece, as he conjured a remarkable late run out of his unwilling partner, swooping from well off the pace to pass both Vincenzo and Saint Segal after that pair had seemed to have the race to themselves at the final fence. Booster Bob was a 16/1 chance but traded at 880 in-running on Betfair when tailed off at halfway, and the only surprise is that he didn’t hit the ceiling price on the exchange, so hopeless did his task appear.

It looked like his jockey’s patience might yield minor prize money, as Booster Bob started passing stragglers in the home straight, but like many a reluctant hero before him, he really picked up when the finish was in sight to claim a victory that had to be seen to be believed.

“He’s a strange horse,” was the winning rider’s post-race verdict.

“He wants softer ground and he changed his legs going round. Once he passed one, he got interested and then he just took off.

“It was only at the back of the ditch I thought he could win.”