The focus of the jump racing world will be on Wales for the next few days.
The Dragonbet Welsh Racing Festival gets underway at Chepstow on Friday. The three-day meeting has become established as the traditional curtain raiser to the core jumps season.
It will be an all-hurdle affair this year, with the chase course still feeling the effects of the summer drought and a drier-than-usual September.
Next Wednesday’s meeting at Ffos Las will stage a number of the chases that were originally due to be held at Chepstow.
The high quality of the racing remains, with the £50,000 Welsh Champion Hurdle sharing top billing with the first Graded race of the season on the opening day of the festival.
The Welsh Champion Hurdle has a prestigious history, with jumping icons Sea Pigeon, Bula, Monksfield and Night Nurse among those to appear on its roll of honour.
It still has an important place in the calendar. Last year’s runner-up Alexei – who found Sam Thomas’s Celtic Dino too good on the day – went on to finish fourth in the Champion Hurdle itself at Cheltenham in March.
The other big race of the day is the £80,000 Persian War Novices’ Hurdle, named in memory of another hurdling legend, one who was trained in Wales by Colin Davies. The first big novice contest of the season, its past winners include Bonanza Boy, Blaklion and Thyme Hill.
Among the races transferred to Ffos Las is the three-mile Native River Chase, which carries a prize fund of £50,000 and is the first high-profile staying handicap of the autumn.
The Listed two-and-a-half mile novice chase, which in previous years has been won by the likes of Cue Card and Finian’s Oscar, is worth £40,000. That is the same value as the handicap chase run over the same distance.
The three-mile veterans’ handicap chase will be worth £30,000.
Welsh jockeys look to be hitting form ahead of the big meetings.
Reigning champion jockey Sean Bowen landed a novice hurdle on Crafty Gael at Southwell last week before heading north to Hexham where he partnered Stay Hopeful to victory in a handicap chase for Irish trainer Cian Collins.
Ellis Collier (photographed) also made a rare trip to the Northumberland track pay dividends by winning a handicap chase on Illogical Logic. It was just his seventh ride at
Hexham.
James Bowen was among the winners at Uttoxeter on Sunday. He teamed up with regular ally Warren Greatrex to land a maiden hurdle with the promising Governors Rock.
On the flat, Thomas Faulkner and Grace Harris moved smoothly into October in winning form. Both were on the mark at Wolverhampton at the end of last week, Faulkner scoring with Tiger Beetle in an apprentice contest and Harris taking a sprint handicap courtesy of Sheik Yerbouti.
