TEAHUPOO can go a couple of places better than last year and win the Paddy Power Stayers' Hurdle (GBB Race) (3.30pm) on day three of the 2024 Cheltenham Festival.
The Gordon Elliott-trained seven-year-old was third behind stable-mate, the admirable veteran Sire Du Berlais, in the Grade One feature of the third day at Prestbury Park last year. And although last year's winner is now a 12-year-old, he has already shown over the past couple of seasons at Cheltenham and the Randox Grand National Festival at Aintree Racecourse that he can still win on the biggest days. But he is 12 and surely his younger stable-mate is set to improve past him and triumph in the three-mile contest.
Teahupoo has not won at the top level over three miles – his did score at Grade Two at Gowran Park last January – as he was fourth in the Punchestown Stayers' Hurdle following last year's Cheltenham third. But on his one run this season he did land a first Grade One victory in the extended 2m4f Hatton's Grace Hurdle at Fairyhouse in December and if he can transfer that form to this longer distance he looks the one to beat. The admirable veterans and former winners Sire Du Berlais and Paisley Park could both make the frame, while Fergal O'Brien's Long Walk Hurdle hero Crambo should also be in the shake-up.
Latest entries and weights for the 2024 Grand National
Henry De Bromhead's ENVOI ALLEN can land back-to-back victories and become the third dual winner of the Grade One Ryanair Chase (Registered As The Festival Trophy) (GBB Race) (2.50pm). Albertas Run (2010-11) and Allaho (2021-22) are the only horses to have won the 2m4f contest twice since it was added to Cheltenham Festival schedule in 2005. And Envoi Allen can follow in their hoofprints with a
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