Joe Tizzard Saturday runners blog: 'I think she's a name for the future'

Cheltenham preparations and that Constitution Hill decision

The final countdown to Cheltenham has very much begun, and for every trainer it’s that time where we just keep everything crossed that the Festival horses stay sound.  With less than two weeks to go, the runners with entries over the four days did their final serious pieces of work earlier this week, we’ll school them next week, and then it’s a case of keeping them ticking over.

We still have a couple of big decisions to make, for example Kripticjim has entries in the Turners and Albert Bartlett, and JPR One is in the Champion Chase and Ryanair, so we’ll wait as long as we need to so we know what the ground will be like, and to see what the potential opposition in the races will be.

We’ve had a brilliant season, and are well on target to easily beat our previous best prize money total since I took over the licence, but almost what’s happened so far doesn’t matter now, it’s the big spring festivals that we’ll be judged on, starting the week after next, so hopefully we can keep things going.

One of our big chances will hopefully be Alexei in the Champion Hurdle, and obviously we had the big news this week that Constitution Hill won't be lining up in that race. It must have been a really difficult question for Nicky Henderson and the owner to answer, and my own view is that they've made the right decision. Of course as a jumps man through and through part of me would love to have seen him try to win another Champion Hurdle, but we all saw what he did on the flat at Southwell last week, and that performance has opened up a whole new chapter for him.

I've seen some people say that this sets a dangerous precedent for jump racing but I don't share that view. This horse is unique and a brilliant hurdler at his best, but the reality is he's fallen in three of his last four starts and on his other start he ran poorly, so it would have been a huge ask to send him over hurdles again.  The wider world would have been watching, and any negative outcome would have had a huge impact on what is the biggest week of the year for the sport.

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