John Ingles provides the Timeform ratings reaction to this week's notable chase performances, including top-class efforts from Inothewayurthinkin and Fact To File.
MARINE NATIONALE 161 > 167
The clear pick on form, Jonbon was sent off at odds on to win the Queen Mother Champion Chase, a race in which his brother Douvan had lost his unbeaten record over fences with a sketchy round of jumping when sent off the 2/9 favourite in 2015. Without another run in the meantime, Douvan was a faller at the tenth in the same race a year later. History repeated itself in a sense as, not for the first time at Cheltenham, where he has also won the Shloer Chase twice, Jonbon’s jumping let him down too, a bad mistake at the ninth ending any chance he had after not the best of starts.
He still managed to plug on for a remote second to add to previous runner-up finishes at the Festival in the Supreme and the Arkle. But that’s taking nothing away from a career-best effort put up by Marine Nationale, winner of the Supreme two years earlier.
Restricted to just two runs over fences in his novice season, Marine Nationale had progressed gradually with each run this term and put in a top-class performance at Cheltenham, comprehensively turning the tables on Solness, in front of him in his two previous starts at Leopardstown, in the process.
While Marine Nationale had 18 lengths to spare over Jonbon at the line (Sprinter Sacre had won by 19 in 2013), with last year’s winner Captain Guinness in third, that didn’t tell the whole story as the latter’s stablemate Quilixios was set to finish second when coming down at the last. The result doesn’t alter Jonbon’s status as the best two-mile chaser around, but Marine Nationale is still lightly raced for an eight-year-old and will likely hold good claims of another Grade 1 success at Punchestown if faced with just the pick of the Irish two-milers.
FACT TO FILE 171 > 174
J. P. McManus might have been out of luck with Jonbon, as well as Arkle favourite Majborough, but there were some noteworthy performances from some of his other chasers, starting with Fact To File in the Ryanair Chase. Last year’s Brown Advisory winner had been taken off the Gold Cup trail after two defeats behind stablemate Galopin des Champs at Leopardstown and the decision to re-route him to the shorter option at the Festival paid off handsomely after being outstayed in his latter starts over three miles.
There wasn’t a better performance all week, in fact, with Fact To File jumping and travelling superbly behind a pace which wasn’t as frenetic as had been anticipated.
Jumping past his main market rival Il Est Francais (not ridden so forcefully as expected) three out, he didn’t look back from then on and was so dominant that Mark Walsh was able to ease him late on for a nine-length victory over Heart Wood, with former winners Envoi Allen and Protektorat completing the frame.
Fact To File took Willie Mullins’ record number of Ryanairs to six, and his high-class performance compares well with two of the stable’s other winners Min (165) and Un de Sceaux (169) and isn’t too far behind those of dual winner Allaho (177 and 178) and Vautour (180) who was so impressive in 2016. Like Min and Allaho, Fact To File had also won the John Durkan at Punchestown earlier in the season (both Galopin des Champs and Inothewayurthinkin among those he beat) and, while he’s young enough for a crack at the Gold Cup next year instead, the King George would surely make more sense beforehand than taking on Galopin des Champs around Leopardstown again.
JAGWAR 144p > 150p
Jumping errors resulted in the Mullins-trained odds-on favourites for the Festival’s two big novice chases, Majborough and Ballyburn, fluffing their lines but both probably remain the best prospects from their respective races, the Arkle won by Jango Baie (158) and the Brown Advisory won by Lecky Watson (156).
But the Plate threw up a most progressive novice in Jagwar who justified connections’ decision to run him in that handicap against largely older/more exposed rivals instead of against fellow novices earlier on Thursday’s card in the Golden Miller, it too now a handicap in its new format.
The six-year-old has improved at a rate of knots since Oliver Greenall and Josh Guerriero sent him over fences and he became the latest Festival winner to have contested the Timeform Novices’ Handicap at Cheltenham’s Trials Day fixture. That win in January took his record over fences to three out of four and resulted in him being sent off the 3/1 favourite for the Plate.
Jagwar was value for more than his winning margin too, as he overcame mistakes, leading under pressure before the last where he lost momentum but asserting again in the final hundred yards to be well on top at the finish with main market rival Thecompanysergeant two and three quarter lengths back in second.
The strong-travelling Jagwar is a fine stamp of a chaser and very much bred for the job too, coming from the same French non-thoroughbred family as the 1994 Gold Cup winner The Fellow. He looks every inch a graded perfomer, and the Manifesto at Aintree is a possible option if he were to run again this season. As a six-year-old, time is very much on his side and he’s one to follow over fences for a while yet.
INOTHEWAYURTHINKIN 164+ > 174+
When Galopin des Champs was beaten into third in the John Durkan Memorial Punchestown Chase in November, bookmakers reacted by making the winner Fact To File the new ante-post Gold Cup favourite for a time. The new Gold Cup winner was in the field but, rather than Fact To File, it was Inothewayurthinkin, who trailed home last of the seven finishers that day beaten the best part of forty lengths.
But much like the previous season when Gavin Cromwell produced him to peak in the spring, landing a gamble in the Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir and then following up in the Mildmay Novices’ Chase at Aintree, Inothewayurthinkin has progressed with each run this season.
Fifth behind Galopin des Champs in the Savills Chase at Leopardstown and then a much closer fourth to the same rival when keeping on in the Irish Gold Cup, Inothewayurthinkin had been shaping very much like a Grand National horse for much of the season. But supplemented for the Gold Cup, he improved again to turn the tables in a fourth meeting with Galopin des Champs, thereby denying him a third win at Cheltenham.
Galopin des Champs was never going with his usual zest and ran a bit below his best whereas Inothewayurthinkin, two years his junior, ran a clear career best which puts him not far behind the pick of Galopin des Champs’ form. Clearly well served by the return to Cheltenham and the longer distance, Inothewayurthinkin took over from Galopin des Champs going to the final fence and kept on well on the run-in to beat him by six lengths.
His sister and stable-companion Limerick Lace was sent off 7/1 for last year’s Grand National after winning the Mares’ Chase but found Aintree a very different test. Inothewayurthinkin, on the other hand, has an obvious profile for a modern-day National and looks thrown in after this improved effort, having been allocated a weight of 11-5. The main issue, however, might be the quick turnaround given that Aintree is only three weeks away.
More from Sporting Life
- Racecards
- Fast results
- Full results and free video replays
- Horse racing news
- Horse racing tips
- Horse racing features
- Download our free iOS and Android app
- Football and other sports tips
- Podcasts and video content
Safer gambling
We are committed in our support of safer gambling. Recommended bets are advised to over-18s and we strongly encourage readers to wager only what they can afford to lose.
If you are concerned about your gambling, please call the National Gambling Helpline / on 0808 8020 133.
Further support and information can be found at and .
