Three Top Four Year-Olds Tackle the Stan James International Hurdle

While many punters obviously consider the re-scheduled Tingle Creek Chase to be the feature at Cheltenham this weekend, the Stan James International Hurdle looks large as a clash of future champions and there is a very real possibility that this race will be an absolute classic. The three most highly-rated four year-olds in the country all line up against each other, representing three different yards in this 2m1f Grade 2 battle over hurdles. .

High-profile Supreme Novices’ winner Menorah comes into this race off a win in the Grade 3 Greatwood Handicap Hurdle at Cheltenham. The King’s Theatre bay has never finished outside the top two and acquitted himself extremely well to score easily at 6/1 on November 14 against a talented field of older geldings. The antepost action sees the Hobbs-trained charge trading as a nearly even-money favourite.

Undefeated Cue Card shares a sire with Menorah and he rose to prominence dramatically by toppling the well-fancied Al Ferof in the Champion Bumper at the 2010 Festival. He took his seasonal debut at Cheltenham by responding extremely well when asked by Joe Tizzard two-out. Some say he’s not as talented as Menorah but you really can’t ask for a better stage to prove it on than this one. You’ll find him priced at 2/1 across the board.

From a neutral perspective, the big variable coming into this one is the absolutely intriguing Paul Nicholls’ gelding Silviniaco Conti who really only emerged this year when he scored a Chepstow-Ascot graded double. He opened the season by tackling a solid field of ten at Bangor-on-Dee that included Grafite. He then followed it up with a novice hurdle score in the Grade 2 Persian War Novices’ Hurdle. Less than a month later he goes on to absolutely wipe the floor with an accomplished group of older geldings in the Grade 2 Coral Hurdle that includes Zaynar, Karabak and Restless Harry. It looks like Nicholls has not found the bottom of this horse yet and you can expect a number of punters to be climbing aboard at his current best price of 3/1. Should he rise on the day to anywhere near 4/1 he will be a supremely good value.