Saturday’s Betfair Tingle Creek Chase could prove a timely opportunity for Il Etait Temps to put his stamp on the two-mile Queen Mother Champion Chase division.
Willie Mullins’s grey is one of six entries left in Sandown’s Grade One feature after the latest acceptance stage for a race over the course and distance at which Il Etait Temps won in spectacular style on the final day of the British season in April.
He is once again due to take on the double-Tingle Creek winner Jonbon as well as L’Eau Du Sud who sprang to prominence with victory in the Shloer Chase at Cheltenham.
However, Il Etait Temps was quickly installed an odds-on favourite by some firms to repeat his Celebration Chase fireworks. Always a fan of course and distance form, Mullins has targeted a return to Sandown for the Tingle Creek since Il Etait Temps impressed at Clonmel last month.
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The champion trainer in both Ireland and Britain won the Tingle Creek in 2016 with Un De Sceaux.
If last weekend’s top-flight hurdles’ action largely resulted in more questions than answers, the spotlight now turns with a vengeance to the two-mile division over fences.
The lightning quick test of jumping is many people’s favourite element of National Hunt racing, including Barry Connell, owner-trainer of the reigning title-holder Marine Nationale.
He is waiting to return to action at Leopardstown over Christmas, but this weekend is likely to see most of the likely threats to his crown get back into competition.
As well as the Tingle Creek, Cork’s Bar One Hilly Way Chase on Sunday may see two of Il Etait Temps’ stable companions, former title-holder, Energumene, and the exciting new kid on the two-mile block, Majborough, line up.
“Both are in great shape and hopefully we’ll get down there,” indicated Mullins who added that another JP McManus owned star, Dinoblue, is likely to line up in a Mares Chase in Cork.
Majborough’s first start out of novice company may attract most attention. The 2024 Triumph Hurdle winner was beaten once in four starts over fences last season, but it was on the biggest day as his jumping fell apart in the closing stages of the Arkle at Cheltenham when third to Jango Baie.
Majborough was subsequently very good at Punchestown and is already prominent towards the top of the Champion Chase betting with Marine Nationale.
Last year’s Hilly Way saw Energumene win for the third time in four years but the sense he might have been lucky through Banbridge’s final fence unseat was underlined by the latter’s subsequent victory in the King George VI Chase.
Mullins has landed the Hilly Way 16 times in the last 18 years.
Few will be working out two-mile calculations more closely than the in-form Dan Skelton, although Britian’s leading trainer this season believes his L’Eau Du Sud faces a significant task to confirm Shloer form with Jonbon, whatever about the Irish raider.
“I don’t really have any negatives. It is hard to say he is going to have improved since Cheltenham, but I think a similar run will get him very close to winning. I’m sure he will run a very solid race and there will be no excuses,” Skelton said.
“Whether he can beat Il Etait Temps and Jonbon, who has a run under his belt, I don’t know. There is no doubt Jonbon will be closer to us. Sandown Park is Jonbon’s favourite track and you have to expect Jonbon to be one of the biggest players.
“I don’t think there will be much between any of them on the day. Put it this way, Jonbon would be favourite if he hadn’t run at Cheltenham as that is his stomping ground.
“Expectation is the wrong word as you can’t be expectant against the sort of horses he is going to come up against as they are Grade One rockets, but I think we belong in that grade now and I think he will be a solid player,” he added.
As uncertainty continues about Constitution Hill’s future following his dramatic second-flight fall in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle on Saturday, his trainer Nicky Henderson hasn’t ruled out drafting his stable companion Sir Gino into replace for Kempton’s Christmas Hurdle.
Sir Gino has shown brilliance over fences but successfully filled in for Constitution Hill in last year’s Fighting Fifth before incurring a serious leg infection last February.
Conditions are testing ahead of Tuesday’s Clonmel fixture which will have to pass a 7.30 morning inspection. Should it go ahead, the value of an in-form stable means most will be keeping Gordon Elliott’s runners firmly on their side.
Staffordshire Knot has largely been a frustrating sort, but he did everything right to win a Pertemps qualifier on Durkan day in Punchestown. He can follow up in a conditions hurdle under Carl Millar again.
The three reserves for the two-and-a-half-mile maiden hurdle are all from Willie Mullins but even if they all got in Elliott’s Spinningayarn would still look the one to beat.
