Joe Tizzard: “Battle of Ideas has a great chance at Chepstow”

We don’t have any runners tomorrow. So it’s all about preparing for a busy few days after Christmas. The Boxing Day and Welsh National Day runners will get ridden on Sunday, and then on Christmas Day, all the staff will come in for a couple of hours in the morning and get the work done.

Elegant Escape and West Approach

On Boxing Day both Elegant Escape and West Approach will run in the Kauto Star Novices Chase. They are both in really good form. Elegant Escape looks a million dollars, and West Approach schooled lovely this week and looks really good.

On the bare form over fences you’d say Elegant Escape is in front of West Approach, but on hurdles form it would be the other way round. There’s not a lot between them. It’s a Grade One and they both deserve to be there, so we can’t stop either one running.

Thistlecrack & Fox Norton

We schooled Thistlecrack this morning and he looked in great nick. He has definitely sharpened up and tightened up for his Newbury run, however he has still got to go and do it in the King George. It certainly looks a hotter race than last year. We are hoping he’ll go and produce a big performance on the track.

We’ve been keen to try Fox Norton over this trip and we’ll find out how good he can be over it on Boxing Day. He’s the fastest horse in the race, so hopefully he can just sit in third or fourth throughout and use his pace at the end. He is in really good form at home.

Battle of Ideas

Battle of Ideas looks like he’s improved again since his win at Plumpton and I’m sure the step up in trip at Chepstow on Welsh National Day will be no problem at all. He’s quite a laid back horse and he doesn’t waste energy in his races, so hopefully he can just sit in behind and travel away and finish strongly. There are plenty of races of this type and grade over the next week so hopefully this race will cut up a bit.  He’s got a great chance, he’s in really good form.

Christmas Day

Having a young nephew makes Christmas Day fun, which is nice, but it’s a hard day’s work for us at the same time. I shall start at half past five, and all the team will be in, and then we’ll do it all ourselves in the afternoon. We always have a good bit of fun in the evening, but come half past nine, ten o’clock, we’re thinking about the next day, and the busy few days ahead.  I have more fun on Christmas Day now than when I was riding. When I was riding I had to always watch my weight and could never eat much food or have a drink. Now I can have a good meal, and have a few glasses of nice wine, and enjoy the day.

I may well be at Wincanton on Boxing Day, with my Dad going to Kempton. We are most likely going to have six at Kempton and four at Wincanton.

Joe