Gowran Park selections Thursday 22nd January
One of the big handicap highlights of the year in Ireland is the Thyestes Chase and happily Gowran has survived persistent rain this week in order to stage their big meeting of the year. However conditions are guaranteed to be extremely testing, so I have two selections for the feature that will act on the heavy ground. Vincenzo (advised 13/8) was a winner for us on Saturday, whilst Kap Vert (advised 9/1) was placed for the each-way bet.
Gowran 3.30: Intense Raffles & Search for Glory
Although INTENSE RAFFLES has struggled to follow up that brilliant Irish National success of 2024 as a 6yo, there have been plenty of reasons why the grey has not been at his best and I give him another chance here with everything in his favour.
I fancied him strongly for that Irish National as he had made such a taking impression as a novice earlier that season. Two wide margin successes, also at Fairyhouse, saw him make all the running with bold jumping displays and he then backed that up with a similar display against a much deeper field in the big event. All of those runs came on seriously soft going.
Last season he was trained with the Grand National purely in mind, but still ran a cracker to be second to eventual Aintree winner Nick Rockett in the Bobbyjo at Fairyhouse. However drying ground at Aintree scuppered his chances, and he never got competitive. He has faced the same problem this season, running respectably over too short a trip at Clonmel, then when the ground was too quick in the Coral Gold Cup at Newbury. The Welsh National would normally seem an obvious target, but he picked a renewal where the ground was as quick for Chepstow’s big race as in any edition over the past thirty years. I expect him to bounce back on ground conditions that will be in his favour, and there is also a possibility he is better on a right-handed track. His prominent racing style will be to his benefit too where his sound jumping can be used to good effect.
SEARCH FOR GLORY seems to have been transformed recently for the application of blinkers and this previously lazy type can go one place better than on his first two starts with the most prominent of headgear in place.
A very strong stayer, he was winning grade races over hurdles at 3m as a novice. He made a strong start to his chasing career in the first half of last season, winning comfortably at Galway before placed efforts in top novice races at Punchestown and Limerick. He failed to go on from that in handicap company, but at a time when the Gordon Elliott yard was not in peak form.
After a modest return in the Troytown, blinkers were applied back at the same track in a listed handicap, and he responded with a much stronger effort when second over 2m4f to Down Memory Lane. He built further on that when a strong finishing second in the Paddy Power over Christmas on quicker going, but he has shown he handles testing ground and whilst in top form he can land that big pot today.
Recommended bets:
1pt each-way – Intense Raffles – 3.30 Gowran – 8/1 Skybet, Paddy Power (1/5 odds 1st 6)
1pt each-way – Search for Glory – 3.30 Gowran – 9/1 Skybet, Paddy Power (1/5 odds 1st 6)
