November Schedule

6/11/24

After a soft launch a couple of weeks earlier, The Jumps Season Service 2024/25 got going properly last Thursday with a bumper 18,000+ words column for Week 1 of the Cheltenham Festival covering just the ‘Big 6’ Championship races and some weekend thoughts.

Those weekend thoughts went well with Henri Matisse (17/2), Martador (6/1), Rebel’s Romance (9/2 ante post) and Kala Conti all successful. A real shame about the French filly Ramatuelle failing the racecourse vet though given that I recommended her ante-post at 12/1 before she easily won the Prix de la Foret and especially as her trainer said there was nothing wrong with her and then seeing how the race panned out with Notable Speech and Porta Fortuna underperforming. C’est la vie. At what point will these racecourse CT scans that also ruled the St Leger winner out of the Melbourne Cup come in for the Grand National and the like over here?

I’ll certainly take the weekend’s results as a whole, though. Going forward, my weekend thoughts in that Thursday column will also be copy and pasted into the Race Previews section where tomorrow I will give some views on the best action at Wincanton and Aintree - the weakest weekend class-wise this side of the New Year so nothing too exciting.

In a change this season, the Cheltenham Festival columns will continue on Thursdays at 7pm in between Week 1 and after the Cheltenham November Meeting rather than wait three weeks as in the past. In Week 2 tomorrow, I will be introducing the novice chase division as well as looking back at the relevant action and Festival-related news in the preceding seven days.

I put up an ante-post recommendation in Week 1 as I usually do, but I will say now that there will be no official ante-post recommendation in tomorrow’s column. The following week ahead of plenty of class horses running at the three-day Cheltenham November Meeting, may well be another matter.

Andy Richmond’s Beating The Bias column highlighting horses to follow has been in full swing for a month now and the first horse off his ‘live list’ won earlier this week.

The General Sports column on Sunday mornings is where I have moved Ante-Post Focus to for non-Cheltenham Festival races but, only for weeks when I have recommended bets rather than weekly, like three days ago when I got involved in both the Coral Gold Cup and Greatwood Hurdle markets. The ante-post section of that column will be copy and pasted into the Ante-Post Focus section to keep that all in one place.

So, what’s coming up on the general sporting front in November to include in that column in addition to weekly Football and NFL updates? The Grand Slam Of Darts starts on Saturday so Mike Henderson will be looking into that tournament from one day in. Judged by the last two TV majors won by Mike de Dekker and Ritchie Edhouse at triple-figure odds, anyone can win it!!

On the snooker front, the world champion, Kyren Wilson, with his confidence bolstered from that success has already added two more titles this season including dismantling the world number one, Judd Trump, in the final of the latest event ahead of the first Triple Crown tournament of the season, the UK Championship, which begins on November 23^rd in York so I’ll be watching plenty of that and offering pre-tournament views.

We’ve seen a few good finishes to races between Sean Bowen and Harry Skelton since I looked at the Jump Jockeys’ Championship race 2½ weeks back when I felt that Skelton offered some value for a season-long interest bet at 7/4. He was five winners behind Bowen at the time and has now moved to five winners in front with his stable moving up a gear. All day long Bowen is the better jockey, and the strongest in a finish of any rider on either side of the Irish Sea in my opinion, but it’s now Evens the pair with William Hill. I think that it will be as tight as that come the end of the season so any injuries and suspensions will be key.

And finally, today Sir Michael Stoute sends out his last runner. Thanks for the memories. My personal favourite horse of his was Pilsudski, one of the original globetrotters who won the Japan Cup, Breeders’ Cup Turf, Canadian International, Irish Champion Stakes and Grosser Preis von Baden in addition to the Eclipse and Champion Stakes back at home. Shergar was just a little before my time but Sonic Lady, Rock Hopper and Zilzal were other favourites. Six Derby winners, 82 Royal Ascot winners and 29 Classic winners all around Europe, I suspect he’ll also be the last trainer to saddle the winner of the Arc and Champion Hurdle!