Galopin Des Champs leads chasing pack for A Plus Tard’s Gold Cup crown

W hen A Plus Tard and Rachael Blackmore charged 15 lengths clear of Minella Indo, the defending champion, in last year’s Cheltenham Gold Cup, most of the 65,000 in attendance would surely have agreed it was one of the more memorable Festival moments of recent times.

But how soon we seem to forget. Twelve months and one race later, A Plus Tard is an 11-2 shot for Friday’s renewal of Cheltenham’s showpiece event. Galopin Des Champs, whose dramatic exit at the last when well clear of the field in last year’s Turners Novice Chase drew the biggest groan of the week from the stands, is a clear favourite to seize A Plus Tard’s crown.

This is a Gold Cup that revolves around a big “if” and it concerns A Plus Tard, not Galopin Des Champs. If Henry de Bromhead’s nine-year-old can reproduce anything close to his winning form in last year’s race, then Galopin Des Champs, Bravemansgame and Noble Yeats will need to improve by some way if they are to stop him completing the double.

His dismal run when favourite for the Betfair Chase in November, the first time in 15 starts over fences he had finished out of the frame, was the result of an infection picked up in transit to Haydock, while a freak knock to a joint immediately before the Savills Chase in December ruled him out of that race.

De Bromhead decided to keep him fresh for the Festival after that minor setback and he reports A Plus Tard has been showing all the right signs on the gallops. It is encouraging, too, that his string has been in excellent form this week, with a winner each afternoon.

Galopin Des Champs is clearly a rising talent, but, like Bravemansgame, he needs to prove himself on the climb to the line. There are no such doubts about A Plus Tard (3.30) and he is an