2018 Gold Cuppin'

Aughex said:
Killultagh Vic runs on Sunday, I wonder what are the chances of him targeting the GC and whether to take the odds on offer now before too late :ninja:
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Should've taken those odds back then, looks a real contender if not for the jumping frailties..
 
Just watched it.

I hope I'm not being biased but for me Edwulf was travelling like the winner the whole way. He made his ground pretty effortlessly and the form all around makes plenty of sense.

I'll crunch some numbers later but my immediate reaction is that Edwulf should just about be favourite for the Gold Cup on the back of that run, especially if they're anticipating more improvement over the next month. He didn't seem to have too hard a race here, unlike Outlander.
 
Biased? not at all...BLIND would be more like it.:blink:

There was only one winner if Vic stood up.

He had already taken the measure of Outlander and was about to land in front of him when he fell

Known for his ability to quicken he would have no doubt pulled away from him whereas your man was flat to the boards to catch the same horse 50 yds from the post.

If you can't see that and you think Edwulf should be favourite for the Gold Cup all I can say is HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Desert Orchid said:
Just watched it.

I hope I'm not being biased but for me Edwulf was travelling like the winner the whole way. He made his ground pretty effortlessly and the form all around makes plenty of sense.

I'll crunch some numbers later but my immediate reaction is that Edwulf should just about be favourite for the Gold Cup on the back of that run, especially if they're anticipating more improvement over the next month. He didn't seem to have too hard a race here, unlike Outlander.
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Don’t be daft now. Might Bite just cracked open another pack of cigars. KV the horse you take out of that race. Some performance after being off for so long.
 
Our Duke still has a lot to learn about jumping fences, and whilst he can improve from the run today, I can’t see him winning a Gold Cup, with that fencing technique.

Might Bite supporters won’t be losing any sleep over the IGC result. His to lose, imo.
 
Grasshopper said:
Our Duke still has a lot to learn about jumping fences, and whilst he can improve from the run today, I can’t see him winning a Gold Cup, with that fencing technique.

Might Bite supporters won’t be losing any sleep over the IGC result. His to lose, imo.
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Agree.
 
Digger said:
Don’t be daft now. Might Bite just cracked open another pack of cigars. KV the horse you take out of that race. Some performance after being off for so long.
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My ante-post commitments and potential returns on Might Bite are significantly more than anything Edwulf might be worth and all other things being equal it's Might Bite's race to lose. But he does have his quirks and I'm not sure his form this season amounts to a great deal. At the same time, I do not believe we will see the real Might Bite until the Gold Cup.

I can accept that KV might have won although my immediate impression was that he might not have found much. I also am clinging to the belief that there will be a good bit more to come from Edwulf next month and that the extra stamina involved at Cheltenham will be a massive boon for him. Bear in mind, too, that he had Minella Rocco, placed last season, well behind today.
 
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Desert Orchid said:
Just watched it.

I hope I'm not being biased but for me Edwulf was travelling like the winner the whole way. He made his ground pretty effortlessly and the form all around makes plenty of sense.

I'll crunch some numbers later but my immediate reaction is that Edwulf should just about be favourite for the Gold Cup on the back of that run, especially if they're anticipating more improvement over the next month. He didn't seem to have too hard a race here, unlike Outlander.
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It was interesting to hear Derek O' Connor say the horse ran himself to exhaustion in last years 4 miler.Joseph is some talent.
 
I backed Edwulf in the four-miler last year. During the race, I kept thinking the jockey must be ridiculously confident of winning and I wondered if he panicked when the leader shot clear. I also wondered at the time if Edwulf's problems started some way before the last.

Before the race last year I wrote:

At around 5/1, those are the odds, I reckon, about Edwulf putting in a clear round. If he does so he wins. The standard required to win this race is rising and it now probably takes as much winning as an average RSA but without being as attritional despite its being a mile or so longer. Minella Rocco at 160 last season was the highest winner of the race I’ve ever rated (and look how that form has worked out) and Edwulf comes in with that figure already in his CV. I honestly think only misfortune can beat him.
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And after it:

This race was a real disappointment in two senses. Firstly, if the handicapper’s new rating for the runner-up Mixed Approach (148) is correct then the quality has dipped from the last couple of years. Secondly, it implies that Edwulf should have won if his previous rating (159) is correct but we don’t know exactly at which point he went wrong. Maybe he got an over-confident ride – the time was very slow and he tried to come from a long way back on the outside – but the chances are he won’t even see the racecourse again.
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Joseph, as someone suggested after the Melboune Cup, is going to make Aiden look like an amateur.
 
I imagine Eddie Harty is happy he avoided today's race, it was tough going for all after early morning rain.
Killultagh Vic just does not like the last at Leopardstown, while Our Duke needed the race and until the second last bar one or two had a nice race.
Any horse 160+ genuine rating can win this Gold Cup if Might Bite does not.
 
Not sure what you mean by genuine..There's more that a few 160+ horses that I wouldn't touch with a barge pole such as Bristol De Mai,Tea For Two, Saphir De Rue, Double Shuffle, Cue Card and Coneygree. tThose you'd have to be insane to back in the win market

Thought Our Duke still had a chance when he made a horrendous blunder but for what he would have been involved in the finish. That said a Gold Cup horse? extremely doubtful.

Sentiment aside Edwolf was very lucky and watching the race again may well have finished 3rd had Killultagh Vic not fallen.

Take a close look at Outlander who definitely started to idle and was bouncing up and down on the same spot half way up the run in but the minute Edwolf comes alongside him he starts to race again.

There has to be a possibility had KV stood up and he had something to race with he would have held on to 2nd.

That aside he does travel well and looks like he'd stay forever. He could be a National horse but on quick ground round Cheltenham would not be sighted in a Gold Cup IMO

As for Killultagh Vic I don't know about the last at Leopardstown but he was a bit clumsy here and there but lets not forget he's really still a novice.

WPM has worked miracles with him. Ok he beat Thistlecrack but that was nearly a year before Thistlecrack emerged as a possible WH horse. He never really came to the fore until the next season when he went off 3rd fav behind Whisper and Cole Harden.

To think a horse who's career was all but over comes back and 2 races later in only his 3rd chase all but wins the Irish Gold Cup that must be considered as a vast improvement on anything he has achieved to date.

This horse improves again and stands up he will make them all go at Cheltenham.

Nicky Henderson has done wonders with Might Bite but let's get real here. He beat Double Shuffle 1 length with Tea For Two right up there backsides.

Any other horse with that form would not be fav and he's going to find Native River one hard nut to crack and he's certainly got to improve on his KG form to beat Sizing John

Of course anything can happen and the throw shyte at the wall brigade on here might land lucky but that is just the way it goes sometime but all things being equal the above I mentioned earlier have no chance.
 
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You cannot simply judge Might Bite on his King George run. It's lazy and does not tell the whole story of his chance.
 
Euronymous said:
You cannot simply judge Might Bite on his King George run. It's lazy and does not tell the whole story of his chance.
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Spot on. Besides, there was nothing wrong with the KG run anyway. The Biter didn’t do a lick in the straight at Kempton, and his superiority over the rest of the field, is in no way reflected by a winning-margin of a length.......in much the same way that his RSA superiority isn’t reflected by beating Whisper a nose.
 
Grasshopper said:
Spot on. Besides, there was nothing wrong with the KG run anyway. The Biter didn’t do a lick in the straight at Kempton, and his superiority over the rest of the field, is in no way reflected by a winning-margin of a length.......in much the same way that his RSA superiority isn’t reflected by beating Whisper a nose.
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I totally agree.

As far as Edwulf is concerned, I'm really suggesting we should not under-estimate either the horse or yesterday's performance [just because KV fell].

Once I've crunched some numbers I might end up saying he's 'just' another Minella Rocco (who was placed in the Gold Cup, let's not forget) but he might also end up with a higher rating than Whisper, for example.

And let's not forget ORs. He was 159 going into last year's four-miler.

Minella Rocco was 156 going into the Gold Cup.

Might Bite was only 154 going into the RSA and only 162 going into the King George.

I'm in the camp that says Might Bite has been seriously under-estimated on ORs since he went chasing. But there's no denying he has his quirks.

It will be interesting to see what OR they come up with for Edwulf for yesterday.

Via Outlander (OR163) he could be 163/164.
Via Djakadam (165) he could be 175.

"Not possible" I hear people cry, "he was only rated 152." Killultagh Vic was 153. He was in the process of beating those horses too. So did everything bar KV and Edwulf run 10lbs and much more below form?
 
I've just watched the finish of yesterday's race again a few times.

Some observations:

That was Outlander's Gold Cup. He was there 100% on the job.

Killultagh Vic would probably have won but I'm not convinced it would have been a wide margin the way Outlander and Edwulf kept pulling away from Djakadam.

Outlander probably had the hardest race of the principals, followed by Djakadam. Edwulf wasn't asked a question until the last, same with KV.

Our Duke might well have beaten the lot of them but for his mistake. That mistake cost him plenty of distance and momentum. I'd also ask why the jockey allowed him to slow up going into the fence. He started the approach to the fence with a share of the lead. By the time he got to it he was two or three lengths down, all in the space of about a dozen strides. He was then shaken up vigorously until approaching the last where, again, he was allowed to slow down for a number of strides. After the last he stayed on pretty strongly again. He is an awful lot better than his finishing position but I haven't seen him race often enough to know if his jumping is a problem.
 
Desert Orchid said:
I've just watched the finish of yesterday's race again a few times.

Some observations:

That was Outlander's Gold Cup. He was there 100% on the job.

Killultagh Vic would probably have won but I'm not convinced it would have been a wide margin the way Outlander and Edwulf kept pulling away from Djakadam.

Outlander probably had the hardest race of the principals, followed by Djakadam. Edwulf wasn't asked a question until the last, same with KV.

Our Duke might well have beaten the lot of them but for his mistake. That mistake cost him plenty of distance and momentum. I'd also ask why the jockey allowed him to slow up going into the fence. He started the approach to the fence with a share of the lead. By the time he got to it he was two or three lengths down, all in the space of about a dozen strides. He was then shaken up vigorously until approaching the last where, again, he was allowed to slow down for a number of strides. After the last he stayed on pretty strongly again. He is an awful lot better than his finishing position but I haven't seen him race often enough to know if his jumping is a problem.
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Our Duke has never been a fluent jumper. He made plenty of minor mistakes before 2 out yesterday. I was amazed he was still as close as he was at that stage.

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Don't know how it stacks up form wise but Edwulf did beat Total Recall by 23 lengths giving him over a stone a while back. How amazing would it be if one wins the GC and one the National...
 
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