From Glos Echo
Cheltenham Racecourse chiefs Robert Waley-Cohen and Ian Renton and Festival-winning owners JP McManus and Terry Warner were among the 150 guests as O'Neill opened the doors at his state-of-the-art HQ in Temple Guiting.
Following a champagne reception, O'Neill discussed some of his string in a question-and-answer session with former Cheltenham Racecourse managing director Edward Gillespie. While stable stalwart Get Me Out Of Here will stay hurdling, a host of O'Neill's younger stars will be making the switch to fences this term. They will include Cheltenham Festival hero Holywell after he proved himself one of the best staying hurdlers in Britain for O'Neill last term.
"He did very well over hurdles last year and he's got a fairly high handicap rating of 157," said the former two-time champion jump jockey. "I'm not sure he's good enough to win off that, to be honest, but he's a nice horse and he's schooled okay over fences."We'll try him over fences and if it doesn't work out we can bring him back to hurdles."
O'Neill said the exciting trio of Shutthefrontdoor, Cloudy Copper and Taquin Du Seuil would also have their attentions switched to the bigger obstacles this season. Shutthefrontdoor has been beaten only twice in eight races to date and finished fourth to Holywell at the Festival.O'Neill said: "He's a lovely horse and we've always loved this fella. "He was good over hurdles but didn't really turn up on the day at Cheltenham, finishing fourth."He schooled over fences and he was brilliant."Everything he's done over hurdles is a bonus because he looks a smart chasing type of horse. "We don't want to be 'bigging' him up too much and we'll let him do the talking, but we're very happy with everything he's done up to now."
Cloudy Copper looked an exciting prospect last season in winning his two races for O'Neill over hurdles. The Gold Cup and Grand National-winning trainer said Cloudy Copper's chances of success would be improved by testing conditions. "He's a lovely horse and he really likes heavy ground," he said. "He won his point-to-point on heavy ground in Ireland and won well at Exeter first time out for us."He also won well in really soft ground at Kempton. "He then had a few injury problems, but we're looking forward to him going chasing. "We think he's a really nice horse to look forward to on really soft ground on stiff tracks. "He stays really well and hopefully he'll make a really nice novice chaser."
Taquin Du Seuil impressed when winning twice last term, but he failed to deliver at the Festival, finishing sixth to Nigel Twiston-Davies' star The New One. As with Cloudy Copper, O'Neill is hoping rain-soaked conditions will again bring out of the best in him."He won a Grade One and a Grade Two race last year on really heavy ground," he said."He didn't perform at Cheltenham, when he'd probably gone 'over the top'."
O'Neill said the Grand National could again be a target for 2012 runner-up Sunnyhillboy, who could be joined in the big-race line-up at Aintree by new recruit Burton Port. Sunnyhillboy unseated Richie McLernon in the race in April, his final outing of a difficult season. O'Neill said: "He had lots of problems with his joints last year and he wasn't easy to keep sound."We didn't get enough races into him and he didn't have a good preparation for Aintree."Hopefully we can get him going a bit more this time and he'll be able to run a few more times. "He's come back from his summer break in good form and at the moment we're very excited about him and we'd love to have another crack at Aintree."
