Can horses win at Cheltenham without a recent run?

There will be much talk over the coming days as to whether or not the 2021 Supreme Novices’ Hurdle winner Appreciate It can overcome an absence of one year and return to the Cheltenham Festival to put it up to the unbeaten mare Honeysuckle in this year’s renewal of the Champion Hurdle.

Appreciate It’s trainer Willie Mullins is a past master of producing his horses in tip top shape after long breaks and has successfully done so in the past at Cheltenham with the likes of Quevega (five times), Arctic Fire and Penhill.

National Hunt horses normally have an optimum break of around 30 days between races but at Cheltenham we see that number rise considerably when we look at the winners of Festival races over the last decade. The average days away from the track for Cheltenham winners since 2012 has been over 57 days.

In fact only 25% of the winners during that period had appeared on a racecourse within the previous 33 days.

Only one winner at Cheltenham over the last ten years raced within the previous seven days. That was Wicklow Brave when he won the 2015 Vincent O’Brien County Hurdle at odds of 25/1 having pulled up at Sandown the previous week. Remarkably the longest gap between races for a winner was the 418 days for Arctic Fire in the 2017 running of the same race and both those horses were of course trained by WIllie Mullins.

Looking ahead to this year’s races here are some of the leading contenders for Festival honours and the number of days since they last ran:

Honeysuckle (37)

Appreciate It (364)

Shishkin (52)

Allaho (51)

Facile Vega (38)

American Mike (87)

Tiger Roll (52)

Jonbon (52)

Constitution Hill (66)

Sir Gerhard (37)

A Plus Tard (78)

Minella Indo (39)

Galvin (78)

Ginto (73)

Teehupoo (24)

Epatante (79)

With the exception of Appreciate it in the above list most of the leading contenders are in or around the optimum number of days you would expect to see based on previous successes at the Cheltenham Festival.

One trainer that is taking a different approach to most at this year’s Festival is Dan Skelton who’s three main contenders, Shan Blue (138 days), Nube Negra (102) and Protektorat (104) have not seen action this year and have been purposely trained with a view to keeping them fresh for Cheltenham.

Skelton said at a recent media day at his Warwickshire stables: “The vast majority of horses must be fresh to do their very best. It’s a requirement at Cheltenham and if you don’t go there fresh, I genuinely don’t think you can win.”