The Cheltenham Festival of 2021 is one that UK horse racing trainers and owners will want to forget, due to the win total they ended the week with. From the 28 races that are spread across four days, the UK came away with just five wins, while Ireland raided and went away with 23 victories.
This led to a lot of questions surrounding how the UK race program currently works, and if trainers are good enough at getting their horses ready for the big day. The first time they have a chance to put that right is in 2022, and although the squad that has been put together doesn’t look capable of standing up and matching Ireland, it does at least need to do better than we saw last season.
The UK challenge is headed by the Nicky Henderson-trained Shishkin, with the latest horse racing odds installing him as the 11/10 favourite to win the Champion Chase. He is the only UK favourite of the four championship races at the festival, the rest all have strong Irish favourites, such as A Plus Tard in the Gold Cup, Honeysuckle in the Champion Hurdle and Klassical Dream in the Stayers Hurdle.
Many from a UK point of view will name Shishkin as being the banker of the meeting from a UK perspective, and if he doesn’t win, it will be a big blow to their hopes of picking up more winners in 2022.
Who Are the Other Main UK Chances?
Champ, who is a stable mate to Shishkin, looks to have a great chance of winning at the 2022 festival, even though he is set to contest a very different race to the one he was expected to run in this season. Known as a chaser, and expected to go for the Gold Cup, he won the Long Walk hurdle in great style at Ascot before Christmas, and that has now put him on course to run in the Stayers Hurdle.
WOW 🤩
Champ is BACK over hurdles and in a BIG way. 👑
Your Grade 1 Howden Long Walk Hurdle winner for @JJONeillJnr & @sevenbarrows 😍 pic.twitter.com/kuxQtQR2cX
— ITV Racing (@itvracing) December 18, 2021
Klassical Dream from Ireland is the favourite for that race, but Champ was very impressive at Ascot on his return to this discipline and can challenge all the way.
The Gold Cup is the centre piece of the entire festival, and if the UK are to have any chance of winning then it will likely come from one of two horses. The Dan Skelton-trained Protektorat is the shortest UK runner in the betting right now, while Chantry House is the other challenger.
Looking back to the 2021 festival, Chantry House won the Marsh Chase in which Envoi Allen was a faller at the time and lost his unbeaten run. While he may not quite have the quality to win the Gold Cup just yet, he looks to be a horse that will prove to be even better for the longer trip, so that will suit.
The UK has chances to better their Cheltenham Festival record from 2021, and will be expected to do so, even if they are not able to truly match what Ireland has.
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