Weekend Preview: It’s the Party season

A considerable cast of considerable characters, familiar to all, each having their own agenda and approach, out to show themselves off or show others up. That’s this weekend’s racing, but it also sounds like a classic company Christmas party, where the traditional typecasts are all too observable and objectionable.

Using a shoe horn, and some creative licence, it’s possible to just about squeeze a highlight horse from the weekend into the stereotypical slippers of a representative Christmas partygoer, by extending their perceptible personalities and qualified qualities.

THE HARASSER

Harasses his males colleagues into drinking and dancing, and the females into flirting and romancing, fancying himself as Christian Grey but all done with a certain charm and confidence that stops short of wandering into pervy territory, so that you can’t help but like him.

I’ve always had UN DE SCEAUX as that type, who works hard and plays harder, alarming and charming in equal measure. Watching him wing and zing around Cheltenham in the Ryanair was probably the pinnacle of the last Festival, tingling the spine and nourishing the soul.

His season tends to start with a bang or a wallop, falling twice but winning on his other four reappearances, all or nothing, never in between, like the party animal he is, and he’s the headline act in the Hilly Way at Cork on Sunday, having the stage to himself now that his formidable friend-cum-foe has other plans…

THE ONE WHO’S TOO COOL TO COME

Even the pledge of ‘I’ll come for one’ doesn’t materialise.

DOUVAN had made out all week that he was coming, too, making his no-show all the more disappointing. Priorities and precious commodities mean that horses shape the season rather than the other way around, as it should be. It’s not a ‘why oh why’ cry as it reflects the pressures and preoccupation involved in racing per se, but it spoils the sport when we’re nearing the mid-point mark of the campaign and neither of the two highest-rated chasers and story-makers – Douvan and Altior – have been seen so far.

THE HAWK

While chaos descends around them, the Hawk stays cool and in control, making a mental note of the faults and failings of their peers, to expose for personal benefit when the time is right.

Last season’s Gold Cups at Leopardstown, Cheltenham and Punchestown were essentially there for the taking, but taking each and every one of them took more skill and strategy than a nominal rating could ever express, and that’s the beauty of SIZING JOHN, the Hawk of the party.

It’s not that Sizing John has greater talent than anything else on the staying scene, more that he’s so efficient and effective, which helps hugely in executing a plan. But his plan for this season incorporates Christmas and beyond, making the John Durkan a platform rather than a pivotal point, which is the reason he could be vulnerable on his return at Punchestown on Sunday, even to a presumed lightweight…

THE LIGHTWEIGHT

If you don’t know or can’t remember the lightweight, that’s because you are the lightweight: already dribbling by the time the main course is served, and guided into a taxi by 10pm.

It’s unfair to pigeonhole DJAKADAM that way, as he’s more mild than wild in character, also a thorough professional, but the fact he doesn’t stay around until the end of the biggest parties has cost him at least one of the three Gold Cups he’s contested.

His CV reads very well, and his rating is as big as almost anything in his division, yet he’s as much maligned as praised, because of what he promised and who he represents. The Gold Cup is his nemesis, but the John Durkan is his saviour, the only race he’s managed to win in his last two seasons, and first time out on both occasions. For Sizing John, the Gold Cup is his Gold Cup, while the John Durkan has become the Gold Cup for Djakadam, and he’ll be 100% primed for it, tipping the scales in his favour on Sunday, small margins making a big difference in their relationship, just a short head separating them in the Punchestown Gold Cup.

THE SECRET COUPLE     

Not in the same orbit day to day, but something’s clearly going on, as come the party come the close connection, benefiting each other, and looking good together.

The more we see, the more we like, of the combination of BRAIN POWER and DAVID MULLINS, who took their relationship to the next level when losing their chasing virginity in swashbuckling style at Kempton, soaring over fences, as Brain Power again looked like being the horse he looked like being as a hurdler.

The Henry VIII Novices’ Chase at Sandown on Saturday would be something of a baptism of fire for Brain Power, in the Grade 1 deep end just 12 days after a smooth swim through shallower waters, but there was something in the way he set about the Kempton chase that suggests a switch has been flicked and a shortfall will be bridged from top company as a hurdler last spring.

THE FULL THROTTLER

First on the dance floor and last off it, boundless energy and enthusiasm, far more impressive in motion than when he’s stood still. You can’t help but admire him.

The energy and enthusiasm that he put into the Grand National meant BLAKLION didn’t quite last out the marathon distance, but he was a sight to behold for at least 3¼ miles, the trip of the Becher Chase. Not many horses take to the National fences like he did, more relevant than marks when it comes to Aintree, but on a direct line through team-mate Bristol de Mai, and their proximity at Wetherby, he’s about 68 lb well-in here, in theory anyway.

THE DARK HORSE

New recruit, overshadowed so far by larger, louder co-workers, but something about him says he may just do something ridiculous when his chance comes to shine.      

The Hennessy Ladbrokes winner Total Recall had a statement made on his behalf before the tapes went up on his first start for Willie Mullins, from Sandra Hughes, by going off at 2/1 for the Munster National.

Same switch, different horse, stronger race, shorter price: Hughes to Mullins, ACAPELLA BOURGEOIS, Troytown, 7/4. It all came unstuck when Acapella Bourgeois fell at the seventh fence, but the points of reference count for much more than the point of departure, a transformation delayed, and he gets the chance to show his newer, truer colours in the Foxrock Handicap Chase back at Navan on Saturday.

There are certainties at Christmas parties, and, despite the old adage, there are such things as certainties in racing, and Acapella Bourgeois is one of them.