Hennessy Gold Cup 2014

Good afternoon all.

Hennessy day tomorrow (Newbury 3pm) and, as usual, it’ll be a gruelling test. Shaping up to be a cracker though.

Masochism it may be after hitting the deck at Aintree but I'm getting straight back in the saddle. Despite the fact that the Hennessy is one of the big staying handicaps that’s tricky from a stats perspective because of the historic success of younger horses (9 of last 14 Hennessy winners were first or second-season chasers), last year's model bagged a small profit so here goes with the tweaked version.

19 are due to line up and my elimination-style stat analysis suggests that the winner should be one of (in race card order):

HOUBLON DES OBEAUX 33/1 (SkyBet 5 places)
ROCKY CREEK 11/1 (several 4 places)
SMAD PLACE 7/1
MIDNIGHT PRAYER 20/1 (SkyBet 5 places), 25/1 (several 4 places)

Expect another big run but, yet again, no cigar for bottom-weight MERRY KING 14/1 (SkyBet 5 places). He ticks almost all the boxes but is still a maiden over 3m+ after 9 attempts.

The stat-analysis can’t split the top 4 and, since all should handle the ground, I’ll be having a small interest in all of them (Smad Place win only because of the short price).

On paper, top-weight HOUBLON DES OBEAUX (11-12) still has a fair bit to find on ROCKY CREEK (11-11) on last year’s result but his best form is at this time of year (won first time out in both of the last 2 seasons and tomorrow is his seasonal bow), Venetia Williams is in decent form and I’m not going to discard the longest priced candidate that ticks all the stat-boxes. In support of both of them, 4 of the last 12 winners had been 1st~6th (<20L) in a previous Hennessy.

Alan King is in great form and has 2 good chances in the race, both second season chasers with excellent strike rates and good experience over Newbury’s stiff obstacles.

With 11-10, SMAD PLACE has a lot of weight for a second-term chaser without a Class 1 chase win but Trabolgan (2005) and Denman (2007) carried top-weight of 11-12 to win the Hennessy in their second season over fences. Both had won the RSA Chase on their previous outing; Smad Place was just touched off in the RSA in March, his last run. Bobs Worth matched the consecutive race-double of RSA and Hennessy in 2012, though with 11-06 at Newbury.

MIDNIGHT PRAYER (10-10) may be Alan King’s second string but he has as good a chance as his stable-mate according to the stats after a good win in the 4m amateur riders’ novice chase at Cheltenham in March. Celestial Gold (also a second term chaser) won the Hennessy in 2004 having been a close 2nd in the 4m chase at the preceding Festival.

Best of luck.