Nicky Henderson stable visit: Lambourn ace looking forward to Festival

Nicky Henderson has revealed that from the 35 runners he’s expected to run at the Cheltenham Festival he doesn’t have any “which ought to win” but believes one or two of his string may just surprise a few.

MTOY, Trainer Nicky Henderson & Bobs Worth

The Lambourn-based trainer the all-time leading trainer at The Festival with 50 successes following four last year and a record seven in 2012 but only has one horse heading up an ante-post market this year in the form of Bobs Worth in the Cheltenham Gold Cup.

Sprinter Sacre at Nicky Henderson’s Lambourn Yard

Queen Mother Champion Chase favourite Sprinter Sacre was scratched from the race earlier this week after not showing the same signs as last year while other stable stars such as Simonsig and Long Run will also be missing from Cheltenham for one reason or another.

“We have got what we have,” Henderson said at his stable tour.

[blockquote source=”Nicky Henderson”]We have not got Sprinter Sacre, Simonsig and we are not going to run Long Run (kept for the Crabbie’s Grand National) but we have good some very good horses.As long as we can find a winner or two at The Festival, we’ll be fine. We have plenty of horses who have good chances and across the board. Last year we went into The Festival with three favourites for championship races and odds-on ones. There is nothing here which ought to win but they can win.[/blockquote]

Henderson gave positive stable reports on both Bobs Worth and his main Champion Hurdle hope My Tent Or Yours, who is a 9/2 shot for the Tuesday spectacular, admitting that both horses have been working “great” ahead of The Festival, which kicks off on March 11.

He also outlined plans to get one more piece of fast work into many of his horses with the Polytrack at Kempton providing a perfect place for his string to get a run out on Friday, although My Tent Or Yours will not participate as he did a proper gallop on Tuesday on grass.

Great picture of My Tent Or Yours and Bobs Worth

Oscar Whisky

Henderson added:

“There are 16 or 17 horses going to Kempton to work on the Polytrack on Friday, while six will go to Newbury on Sunday including Bobs Worth, Captain Cutter (Neptune Investment Management Novices’ Hurdle & Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle), Triolo D’Alene (Handicaps), Royal Boy (Neptune Investment Management Novices’ Hurdle & Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle) and maybe Vaniteux (Sky Bet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle & Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys’ Handicap Hurdle).

“That is the battle plan. We haven’t been running them for very obvious reasons.”