HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Not the greatest start to 2009 with the frost ruling out several jumps fixtures, but on the bright side, the Cheltenham Festival gets underway in two calendar months’ time!

One horse that could be landing honours in March if found a suitable target is Calgary Bay, who looks to be getting the kid gloves treatment from Hen Knight. The Dipper winner was impressive on New Years Day and is one of many winners (and runners-up) from the trends book to look forward to in the coming months.

Talking of Cheltenham, it fascinates me at this time of year how short some of the leading players are in the markets and it is hard to believe at this stage that Binocular (11/8), Master Minded (4/7), Punchestowns (2/1) and Denman (7/4) will all oblige come the hour – just a case of knowing what ones to take on. Master Minded would be the one I’d least want to be against at this stage. What price would Kauto be if Denman has another setback?

PERFORMANCE RATINGS

“DIPPER” NOVICES’ CHASE – Calgary Bay 70


TOP OF THE FORM

It was a bright start to the year for the Top 20 with plenty of winners emerging so long may it continue in the coming weeks – I even managed to get off the mark in the RFO naps table!

It wasn’t an easy choice this week, though, with three horses all nap material – Kia Kaha, Rebel City and Willkandoo. In the end it was Rebel City that got the vote after a flying third over 7f, the trip he again faces on Friday.

It’s also a big year for the RFO who celebrate an anniversary and I’m proud to be able to contribute to a paper that for many years has brightened up a gloomy Tuesday. Nine months of Top of the Form have flown by and I’ve been pleased with how things have gone, especially the feedback from readers.

There were different ways I could’ve produced the chart, but opted for the current format as it gave an opportunity to introduce several new races each week that regularly knock on the door. In order to do this, I had to drop certain races in which the top half of the field have all reappeared or are either two months to create the room, which isn’t ideal if they are still working out well, but once they have been highlighted to readers then it is optional whether to carry on following the protagonists from that event.

Such an example is Ivory Silk’s race from Great Leighs in November where the top five have now all run since with Ivory Silk and Silvanus appearing recently. This event may well remain hot but I have omitted it so that other events can enter the chart while they are churning out the winners and before they become stale.

Please get in touch if you’d like to see something introduced or ways of improving the format – apart from the weekly entries which is an ongoing battle! I’ve managed to do them for the eyecatchers this week as below (older runners from October have been omitted):

Alonso De Guzman, Arctic Freedom
Bavarian Nordic, Brazilian Brush
Castano
Dragon Eye
Edgeover
Emirates Sports
Golden Pool
Kack Handed (fri, sat)
Kia Kaha (thu, fri, sun)
L’Homme De Nuit
Leceile
Oracle Des Mottes
Persian Peril (sat)
Pezula Bay
Piscean
Rebel City (fri)
The King Of Angels
Willkandoo (fri)