Meade monitors water levels at Cheltenham

Racing: The decision to start watering at Cheltenham has not been met with much glee at Noel Meade's Tu Va Stables.

Racing:The decision to start watering at Cheltenham has not been met with much glee at Noel Meade's Tu Va Stables.

Meade houses current Champion Hurdle favourite Go Native, who is also chasing the WBX.COM £1million bonus after winning the Fighting Fifth and Christmas Hurdle this season.

Go Native landed the Supreme Novices' Hurdle at the meeting last term on good to soft ground, and Meade hopes clerk of the course Simon Claisse is not too liberal with the water.

He said: "I'm sure a lot of trainers of soft-ground horses will welcome the news, but then there are those like us that don't really want it. But he handled it last year in the Supreme when it was good to soft and it had rained on the Monday night.

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"The danger is if they get it wrong and over-water or it rains heavily overnight, you just never know. The ground at Kempton was against him - it was tacky - and that's what he doesn't want. He's in fine form at the moment anyway and we are just counting down the days."