Cheltenham Festival 2017 – Jockey Sam Twiston-Davies keeping his fingers crossed for a Festival winner
Ballyandy was last seen winning the Betfair - Britain's richest handicap hurdle - and is set to run in the Supreme on the Tuesday of the Festival
IT’S seven years since Sam Twiston-Davies booted home Baby Run in the Foxhunter Chase for his first Festival winner.
These days he’s in an enviable position as stable jockey to champion trainer Paul Nicholls as well as picking up plenty of rides for his father Nigel.
Growing up in the Cotswold hills above Cheltenham he understood the importance of jump racing’s greatest meeting from an early age.
Twiston-Davies, 24, said: “You can have a good season and people will remember it for not having a Cheltenham winner – it’s mad.
“The dream is always to ride one winner and if you do that it’s to go on and ride as many as you can.
“The day I won on Baby Run was the same day Nige won the Gold Cup with Imperial Commander.
“Then Pigeon Island went and won the Grand Annual.
“That was one of the best day’s racing I’ve ever had.
“You never forget those kind of feelings – that’s what makes Cheltenham special.”
This year Twiston-Davies is hopeful of kicking off the Festival with a winner in the traditional curtain-raiser, the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle.
He said: “Ballyandy is one of my better chances of the week.
He’s come out of the Betfair Hurdle really well.
“He had the option of the handicaps off nice weights but the Supreme Novices’ is a race he looks capable of winning.
“He’s got handicap experience and he’s battle hardened. He won the bumper on the same track last year, travels well, trips fine, whatever the ground it shouldn’t bother him. so he’s got a lot more ticks than question marks.”
Old favourite The New One will try to make it fourth time lucky in the Champion Hurdle.
The nine-year-old, trained by Sam’s dad Nigel, was badly hampered when third behind Jezki in 2014 and has finished fourth and fifth in the Festival’s top hurdles contest in the last two years.
Twiston-Davies added: “It’s probably the worst Champion Hurdle he’s ever run in so he would have to have some sort of chance.
“He’s not nearly as sharp as he used to be but he’s got good form in the book so hopefully he can put up a big performance.”
Nicholls hasn’t got many arrows to fire in the week’s top races but he has plenty of chances in the handicaps for Twiston-Davies to ride.
Dodging Bullets was the last to give Twiston-Davies and Nicholls a Grade 1 success at the Festival in the 2015 Champion Chase. But the trainer has high hopes for novice Politologue, who runs on Thursday.
Twiston-Davies said: “Politologue has improved for jumping fences.
“He’s a versatile horse and he’s come through his prep for the JLT Novices’ Chase really well. Hopefully he’s capable of a big run but I think it’s a very competitive race.
“The Close Brothers Novices’ Handicap Chase has been Romain De Senam’s plan for a long time.
“He’s a spring horse so he could surprise a few.
“Dolos is interesting in the Fred Winter. He was beaten favourite at Taunton last time but the two horses that beat him — Air Horse One and The Unit — have both come out and won. He’s interesting.
“Saphir Du Rheu is probably too high in the weights to win a handicap and he’s not up to winning the Grade 1s. Hopefully we can pick up some prize-money in the Gold Cup.”