Galopin Des Champs is back at Willie Mullins and looks really well. He’s a very good racehorse and I loved what saw from him last year.
If I had a doubt or a worry about Galopin Des Champs repeating his Cheltenham Gold Cup heroics, it’s can he bounce back from that effort to win it again?
When you run in the type of Gold Cup he ran in last March – to me it was a proper test. It was a proper gallop – it was end-to-end, the lesser horses fell away and the principals stayed at it.
The cream rose to the top and the best two horses were left after Hewick took a tired fall and Galopin Des Champs stayed galloping all the way to the line to beat Bravemansgame by seven lengths.
You then saw how much it took out of them both, when they were beaten by Fastorslow at the Punchestown Festival.
Is Fastorslow a better horse than Bravemansgame or Galopin Des Champs? I don’t think so.
Did his trainer Martin Brassil think he might nab a big pot in for finishing third? Yes, he did. But it was a brilliant training performance and race-planning by Martin Brassil.
But I don’t think Fastorslow is a better horse than Galopin Des Champs (even though he had bumped into the future Grand National winner Corach Rambler winner at Cheltenham.)
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We’ve seen before how Minella Indo went to the bottom of what he had a couple of years ago to beat A Plus Tard in the Gold Cup – he didn’t come back from it.
A Plus Tard was breath-taking in the Gold Cup the year after at the Cheltenham Festival – but he didn’t get over it.
When you look at those two impressive recent winners – and there’s plenty more – you just wonder what Galopin Des Champs are we going to see this season?
Now, don’t get me wrong. He looks a million dollars but I always go back to Kauto Star’s 2006/07 season. He looked unbeatable, winning a Tingle Creek, King George VI Chase and the Gold Cup among others. He won the biggest races, over multiple distances.
But when he lined up the next Autumn in the Old Roan Chase at Aintree – despite looking a million dollars – at no stage was he ever going to win that race. He couldn’t keep up with Monet’s Garden, he was beaten at half-way.
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You look at the Rugby World Cup and teams not matching a performance from week to week, and they can talk to you!
A horse can’t tell you how it’s feeling
Galopin Des Champs is showing all the right signs at home, he looks a picture and is cantering away.
He’s deceptive in that it’s only when you see him walking down the yard that you appreciate how big is he.
You’d look at him from a distance and wonder how does he go the three mile distance and carry those weights. But when you stand into him, he’s very tall.
However, until he lines up in a race and we see how he goes through it, we won’t know how he is. You just can’t replicate a race.
Are you going to replicate a race like the Gold Cup for the sake of having a trial? No. You’re going to take your chance and see how you get on and build from there.
But it does make you wonder. When a horse puts in a career-best performance, how long does it take them to get over it? That is my one doubt with Galopin Des Champs.
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