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Binocular the star of Day 116th March 2010
The 2010 Cheltenham Festival has started with a bang with a day of surprises leaving the bookmakers well ahead after an eventful day at Prestbury Park.
Today’s attendance on the opening day of the 2010 Festival was 50,945, 3 per cent up on the crowd figure of 49,450 on the same day last year.
The star of the day was no doubt Binocular who claimed the Champion Hurdle in stunning style to compete a remarkable couple of weeks for the horse.
It was just a couple of weeks ago that Binocular was all but ruled out of the Festival with an injury but having recovered quickly claimed the win, with AP McCoy on board looked every inch the class horse of an open field.
Those injury doubts had caused Binocular to drift in the Champion Hurdle betting with the Nicky Henderson horse going off at a good looking 9/1 as they went to post.
All the talk before the Champion Hurdle was surrounding Go Native who went off as the favourite but he never got in the race, only Khyber Kim managed to challenge Binocular with Zaynar back in third.
The first race of the Festival was of course the Supreme Novices' Hurdle when Dunguib took his place as an odds-on favourite following a huge gamble from punters on both sides of the Irish Sea.
He never looked in great shape as he was outclassed by 12/1 shot Menorah who took a surprise win to leave the bookmakers delighted. A Dunguib win would have been a disaster for the bookies and they duly got their wish with Dunguib stuttering to third place.
The Arkle Challenge Trophy was collected by Sizing Europe for Henry De Bromhead who stayed on well despite being closed down by the good looking Somersby. It was an exciting race as usual with yet another favourite in Captain Cee Bee never in the frame as punters continued to have a bad day at the office on the first day of the Cheltenham Festival.
The William Hill Trophy was another exciting race with a large field that saw the two favourites beaten, the well fancied Bensalem fell a few from home to the dissapointment of many punters. In the end it was the 33/1 outsider Chief Dan George who held off a late charge from the favourite The Package in what was yet another surprise on day one of the meeting.
Garde Champetre was the favourite to claim his third successive Cross Country Chase for Enda Bolger but with Nina Carberry on board could only manage a disappointing 5th place. A New Story was having his third run in the race but at 25/1 was no more than a live outsider before the race but fairly bolted up to claim the win from Lami.
Only one favourite on day 1 of the Cheltenham Festival delivered the goods and that was the excellent looking Quevega in the David Nicholson Mares Hurdle. We had not seen the Willie Mullins horse since she won the race last season but she was just as impressive in 2010, she had too much class and speed for the field to give the punters a crumb of comfort to go home with.
Binocular and AP McCoy are clear as they jump the last in the 2010 Champion Hurdle