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2 Mile Chasers 20/21

frontrunner said:
Jinny I know you know more about ground and how horses cope with it than I will ever know. What I do know from having a very few runners at Sandown is the two tracks ride very different. The hurdle course is horrendous when there is a lot of rain , I remember walking across it and nearly losing a boot. However IMO the ground on the chase course today was nearly perfect winter ground. The fact that Harry Whittingham walked the course this morning and ran Rouge Vif along with the times being just outside standard back that up. For me the word reached 7 barrows that Nichols had his pair cherry ripe and Henderson sided stepped the battle. All this looking after the horse when not so long ago the said trainer was injecting illegal substances into them makes me laugh.
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Oh don’t get me wrong, I am not a huge fan of his! Back in the day when I worked for Charlie Nelson, we had a lovely horse called Taxiads. I used to ride him out every day. In the winter he went to Hendos for hurdling then came back. So after he ran at the end of the season, I was dropped at the yard with tack to ride him back up to Upper Lambourn. I went into his stable to find the horse who had run the night before, still covered in race sweat, still plaited and with two twisted racing plates therefore hopping lame. I was absolutely furious. So aged 19, I marched into the office and tore him off a shred! :lol:

And yes I wouldn’t trust him an inch especially over the anti bleeding drug Tranexamic acid he was administering. (IMO he should have had a lengthy ban)
 
frontrunner said:
Jinny I know you know more about ground and how horses cope with it than I will ever know. What I do know from having a very few runners at Sandown is the two tracks ride very different. The hurdle course is horrendous when there is a lot of rain , I remember walking across it and nearly losing a boot. However IMO the ground on the chase course today was nearly perfect winter ground. The fact that Harry Whittingham walked the course this morning and ran Rouge Vif along with the times being just outside standard back that up. For me the word reached 7 barrows that Nichols had his pair cherry ripe and Henderson sided stepped the battle. All this looking after the horse when not so long ago the said trainer was injecting illegal substances into them makes me laugh.
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The times of both 2 mile chases suggest there was nothing wrong with the ground. Nicky bottled it.
 
henderson

1) the hardest consideration he'd have to make would be foregoing the prize money he could win for his owners in a grade 1, on top of losing their entry free, i can't imagine it's an easy decision to do this and he obviously feels it's right by the horse and his chances in march more than anything. i can understand that

2) his pre race comments and general commentary regarding altior is where my main issue lies, if you're going to be this careful with an ageing horse maybe don't wax lyrical over his work and claim he looks as good as ever? maybe just misleads the public/punter? (although i'd suggest a seasoned punter should take such comments with a grain of salt with most trainers)

3) still hard to shake the viewpoint i have of henderson as basically a trainer who is all about cheltenham/spring festivals. he's a track record of doing all he can to keep his good horses away from hard and competitive races as much as possible as long as ive followed the sport. does it benefit them in the long run in terms of winning big races at the spring festivals? probably. his cheltenham record is what it is for a reason. does it perpetuate the long running issue people have with national hunt racing in the modern era where everything is just a buildup to the spring? hard to argue against it.
 
The interview with Lydia was raw enough.

He ultimately trains the horse and in comparison to others is ultra cautious

I hope champ comes to Dublin over Christmas still
 
Your second point is the main one isn't it - if they'd said we're very happy with him but want to be mindful of him with the season ahead, then absolutely fair enough. He doesn't owe anything to anyone and realistically has one shot at March left in his career.

Instead we get the Kings Stand and nothing can live with him at home commentary all through the week which gets everyone excited again, including myself, as he's a true legend of the game and these are the days we live for.

I've got huge respect for Hendo and enjoy listening to him talk about his horses, but he doesn't half make it more difficult than it should be for himself at times.
 
Something doesn't ring true with me, Altior has gubbed Politologue every time they've met.
So no reason to miss another head to head ( see my post earlier why wasn't Politologue long odds on).
Something amiss with the stable ( look at yesterday and today's results). Or something amiss with Altior, who at his age has 1 cup final left.
Thought Hyslops interview with NJH lacked any real thought (as does most of her work). She asked why is Cheltenham the be all and end all, sorry Lydia you host a show called the road to Cheltenham???
 
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Bottom line is this.

There was - in the end-game - absolutely no reason to pull Altior out of the Tingle Creek, on account of the ground.

This leaves us with three plausible scenarios:

1) Henderson was misled about the state of the ground
2) Henderson misread the state of the ground
3) Henderson didn’t want to run, for reasons we can only guess at.

1 & 2 above are beneath the competencies of a multiple Champion Trainer, which leaves us with 3) as the only logical option.

I choose not to guess, because Cause is less of a consideration than Effect. Altior will be an 11yo in March, and no matter how moody a Champion Chase it might look, he is for opposing 100%.
 
tiggers1972 said:
Something doesn't ring true with me, Altior has gubbed Politologue every time they've met.
So no reason to miss another head to head ( see my post earlier why wasn't Politologue long odds on).
Something amiss with the stable ( look at yesterday and today's results). Or something amiss with Altior, who at his age has 1 cup final left.
Thought Hyslops interview with NJH lacked any real thought (as does most of her work). She asked why is Cheltenham the be all and all, sorry Lydia you host a show called the road to Cheltenham???
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I like Lydia.

I think she’s getting a hard time on social media for that interview. Hendo was seething, and probbslt didn’t want to face up to it. Lydia had the uncanny task of asking the tough questions, and you could tell that with the spluttering in her interview. Also trying to ask them without annoying him too much so they/she can still get interviews etc in the future.

Hendos well Media trained. Worth noting Nicholls reckon something is a miss with Altior, whether he’s just trying to play games I don’t know, but he wasn’t convinced it was ground related.
 
Grasshopper said:
Bottom line is this.

There was - in the end-game - absolutely no reason to pull Altior out of the Tingle Creek, on account of the ground.

This leaves us with three plausible scenarios:

1) Henderson was misled about the state of the ground
2) Henderson misread the state of the ground
3) Henderson didn’t want to run, for reasons we can only guess at.

1 & 2 above are beneath the competencies of a multiple Champion Trainer, which leaves us with 3) as the only logical option.

I choose not to guess, because Cause is less of a consideration than Effect. Altior will be an 11yo in March, and no matter how moody a Champion Chase it might look, he is for opposing 100%.
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Good post, and I fully agree.
It was posted on here on the Tuesday what the ground could be. It was also posted Wednesday by several posters he could get pulled.

I was on Altior, but that bets in the bin now. I’ll be on Chacun (on the day) providing he gets there. Looks like it’ll be another poor renewal though. Even if he doesn’t run between now and then, if Altior turns up in March he goes off really short.
 
I've done a rough sectional comparison of the Henry VIII and Tingle Creek; "rough" in the sense that I started the timing as the leaders' withers were over the first fence and there were no decimal points in the clock so my timings are based on whole seconds therefore could be up to five lengths wrong either way.

We know the novices' overall time was about a second (five lengths) faster but I wanted to get an idea of where those lengths were gained or lost. The answer was very straightforward.

Both fields got from F1 to F2 in 13s but from there on the long run to the next the novices gained two seconds (10 lengths). The older horses pulled back a second (5L) on the run to the next and from there all the way to the line they matched each other second for second, ie Allmankind maintained his five lengths lead over Politologue all the way. But let's not lose sight of the fact that the novice, being only a 4yo, carried 11lbs less.

With no classy big-field handicap over CD on the card, perspective is naturally limited but I would suggest Politologue looked pretty comfortable out in front whereas Allmankind looked more 'on it' the whole way, as is his style.

Greaneteen perhaps deserves a slight mark-up as he made his big move around the bypassed Pond Fence which merely served to signal to Skelton that it was time to kick on Politologue.

Hitman probably covered the run-in slightly faster than both winners given that he closed the gap on Allmankind by a couple of lengths.

The comparative times didn't surprise me, to be honest. I'd said beforehand that my tentative rating for Allmankind would already be good enough at least to make the frame in a normal Arkle. In him and Hitman Britain at least has two very worthy candidates to worry the Irish come the festival.
 
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Only saw Lydia's interview now. Can't see what the fuss is about. Think what she was trying to ask why isn't the tingle creek a target in its own right. That there were noises about this mid week suggests that it wasn't ground related. Henderson didn't like the implication. Whether it's binocular, epatante or altior it does happen to Henderson a bit.
 
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The reason for the anger is he put punters away all week long. People invested their hard earned money on words that came out of his mouth.

After racing on Friday, with no prospect of further rain, the chase course was soft, good to soft as the two mile chases told us. Therefore it’s hardly surprising there is a furore and bitter taste when Henderson pulls Altior.

I will offer number 4 to Grassy’s list above. He absolutely bottled it. And number 5, have the stable staff had a nice Christmas bonus at the expense of punters?

In the past I’ve defended his decisions, but this time I can’t. He has put people away all week long. Surely those that want to defend him understand that? If he was keeping his powder dry, and not writing these things in his bookmaker paid for blog, perhaps people would feel differently.
 
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To clarify, the fuss over Lydia's interview that I was referring to was Lydia's interviewing. Not about Henderson's antics.
 
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JamesRB said:
henderson

1) the hardest consideration he'd have to make would be foregoing the prize money he could win for his owners in a grade 1, on top of losing their entry free, i can't imagine it's an easy decision to do this and he obviously feels it's right by the horse and his chances in march more than anything. i can understand that

2) his pre race comments and general commentary regarding altior is where my main issue lies, if you're going to be this careful with an ageing horse maybe don't wax lyrical over his work and claim he looks as good as ever? maybe just misleads the public/punter? (although i'd suggest a seasoned punter should take such comments with a grain of salt with most trainers)

3) still hard to shake the viewpoint i have of henderson as basically a trainer who is all about cheltenham/spring festivals. he's a track record of doing all he can to keep his good horses away from hard and competitive races as much as possible as long as ive followed the sport. does it benefit them in the long run in terms of winning big races at the spring festivals? probably. his cheltenham record is what it is for a reason. does it perpetuate the long running issue people have with national hunt racing in the modern era where everything is just a buildup to the spring? hard to argue against it.
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Good post, James.
 
Tbf to Nicky, Altior has only raced 16 times in a 7yr career, which indicates the horse is well looked after, Just 1 defeat in that period too, ironically, in a race his trainer openly admits he ballsed up, racing him.
He knows the horse better than any of us, and clearly thinks it wouldn't do him any favours, so maybe some are being a tad harsh on him?
 
I’ve just seen the interview for the first time.

I don’t think anyone is questioning his ability as a trainer, reet, but his body language and attitude smacked of the ‘how dare you even question me about it’ manner, we’ve seen from him before.

It’s his bullsh*it excuse for not running the horse that has most people’s back up. Ground is subjective of course, but it isn’t Heavy just because Nicky Henderson says so.

The guy is also retained by a bookmaker. He knows there will be ante-post money on a race like this, and in that context, what he says pre-race about the favourite matters. To claim thereafter that he “only cares about the welfare of the horse”, will be a further source of irritation to any punters who have spent real money backing Altior, on the back of all his bullish updates throughout the week.

Far from being media-savvy, Henderson always comes over as crotchety, defensive, aloof and dis-interested in the welfare of punters, in these scenarios. And it’s never a good look.
 
I remember Hendo pulling a fancied one last year, and after drifting like a barge all day in the exchange, he pulled it and announced it via his Unibet blog, of whom had the horse at the biggest price of all the books. :blink:
 
Grasshopper said:
I’ve just seen the interview for the first time.

I don’t think anyone is questioning his ability as a trainer, reet, but his body language and attitude smacked of the ‘how dare you even question me about it’ manner, we’ve seen from him before.

It’s his bullsh*it excuse for not running the horse that has most people’s back up. Ground is subjective of course, but it isn’t Heavy just because Nicky Henderson says so.

The guy is also retained by a bookmaker. He knows there will be ante-post money on a race like this, and in that context, what he says pre-race about the favourite matters. To claim thereafter that he “only cares about the welfare of the horse”, will be a further source of irritation to any punters who have spent real money backing Altior, on the back of all his bullish updates throughout the week.

Far from being media-savvy, Henderson always comes over as crotchety, defensive, aloof and dis-interested in the welfare of punters, in these scenarios. And it’s never a good look.
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Well, he is the champion trainer and he does train and know the horse so I would say he does know best and therefore can be excused for being tetchy (understatement) about it. He is probably scarred by how badly Altior came out of the Cyrname race and without that experience he may well have taken the chance, but it’s fair enough that he didn’t want to risk it.
 
Is it fair enough, barjon?

No-one disputes Henderson knows the horse best. It’s his insistence that the ground was Heavy - when it patently was not - that’s at the heart of the run/don’t run decision, and he is arguably less able to make an objective judgement in this than most.
 
Colin Phillips said:
One has to remember that Henderson is a serial liar. Wouldn't be out of place in politics.
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"Incontinently mendacious" is an expression I was introduced to recently. I think it applies to most trainers.

Like all bad liars, though, they make mistakes further down the line and betray earlier lies.

But we can hardly expect Hendo to come out on TV and say, "We heard Politologue is 110% ready and we're only 95% so we're shiting out of it." He has to say something that people can accept as preferable to cowardice.
 
The timing of the announcement says to me there was something fishy about it all. Why not wait until the morning of the race to make a decision?

NJH has put punters away here and I’d expect stable staff have got a nice Xmas bonus out of it


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Was an amusing interview and a clear message to the underlings. I train the horse, end off.

Correct.
 
Grasshopper said:
Is it fair enough, barjon?

No-one disputes Henderson knows the horse best. It’s his insistence that the ground was Heavy - when it patently was not - that’s at the heart of the run/don’t run decision, and he is arguably less able to make an objective judgement in this than most.
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However you describe the ground he thought it would give Altior a hard time and he knew that the horse has the courage to force it and harm himself in the process. I can’t really think of another motive for taking him out other than he thinks Altior is past it, in which case we might never see him again.
 

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