Joe Tizzard: JPR One is favourite for a reason
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Trainer and Coral ambassador Joe Tizzard discusses the chances of his six runners at Aintree, Chepstow and Sandown on Saturday.
It’s a really important day for us, with some lovely runners entered across three meetings, so fingers crossed the weather won’t change those plans, with Chepstow and Sandown concerned about much more rainfall.
Aintree shouldn’t have any issues, though, and we run four there, starting with Honey Jack in their opener.
He’s had just the one run, in a Bumper at Newbury last month, so we’re wasting no time going hurdling with him.
He’s been schooling well and in time I’m sure he’ll be a nice horse but this is all part of his education, it’s a nice starting point to get him handicapped.
Chepstow will have to pass an early morning inspection and if it does, this fellow will love the heavy ground.
He bounced back to form at Lingfield last time and that would give him an excellent chance here, especially as he gets weight from a couple of other last time out winners.
Moonlight Artist was a big baby last season but he did really well over the summer and came on a load for his first run of the season to win really well at Exeter last time.
He’s gone up five pounds for that win but I still think he’s the right side of the handicapper, he enjoyed the step up in trip, and this should suit him well. I’m sure there’s more to come from him.
War Lord ran a lovely race on his reappearance in the Haldon Gold Cup last month, finishing third behind Elixir De Nutz, who of course followed up at Newbury last weekend, so the Exeter form looks good.
He galloped all the way to the line at Exeter, so this step up a couple of furlongs in trip will really suit him and although he’s giving weight to most of his rivals, that’s because he has the form in the book.
He should be competitive in what looks a nice race.
We all know what happened with this fellow at Cheltenham last time, when he was going to put up a massive performance before stumbling after jumping the last.
We were obviously really disappointed with that but the positive was we knew we had a very good novice chaser on our hands.
He was absolutely fine after that race, as I say it wasn’t even a fall, and so we didn’t need to find a smaller race for him as a confidence booster as his confidence wasn’t affected at all and he’s schooled really well since so I have no issues in running him at this Grade One level.
Barring that stumble, he was going to win impressively at Cheltenham, he’ll have no problems with soft ground at Sandown, and he’s favourite for a reason.
The Big Breakaway will come on plenty for his reappearance in the Badger Beer and this has always been the plan as we want to give him some experience of the National fences, following his unlucky early exit from the big race back in April.
He will have to show he takes to the big fences but I’ve no reason to think he won’t as he’s normally a reliable jumper.
With Brendan Powell riding JPR One at Sandown, we were delighted to book Harry Cobden for this horse earlier in the week, he can get him into a lovely rhythm, the three mile plus trip will suit, as will soft ground, so there are plenty of positives.
Joe
