Blast From The Past: Paddy Power Gold Cup

Last year this column looked back at the 2002 renewal of what was then the Thomas Pink Gold Cup, which was won in emphatic style by the Martin Pipe-trained Cyfor Malta. That was a top-class performance on Timeform ratings, but there was an even better figure put up in the race ten years later by Al Ferof as he defied a BHA mark of 159 on his handicap debut.

As had been the case near the turn of the century the Pipes were still very much the yard to be with in what was by this stage the Paddy Power Gold Cup, Martin Pipe having won the 2004 and 2005 renewals before son David took the race in 2011 with Great Endeavour (after a near miss in 2006 with Vodka Bleu), and Grand Crus was all the rage in the betting prior to the 2012 renewal. Grand Crus was a top-class hurdler who had only been beaten in Britain by Big Buck's in 2010/11, and having only met with defeat once during a novice chase campaign which saw him beat both Silviniaco Conti and Bobs Worth in the Feltham at Kempton, he seemed to have been let into the handicap lightly from a mark of 157. Sent off at 7/4, Grand Crus failed to live up to his lofty billing, however, putting in a tame effort and raising further concerns about his physical wellbeing (had scoped badly when below par in the RSA Chase on his last start).

The race also featured the wildly progressive Hunt Ball, who had improved 90 lb on Timeform ratings in the previous season, winning seven times including at the Cheltenham Festival, but he was unable to return in the same sort of form from a career-high handicap mark. Two of the four runners that were sent off at single-figure odds failed to complete, but the other two - Al Ferof and the Alan King-trained Walkon - filled the first two places. Though getting 16 lb from Al Ferof in gruelling conditions, second-season chaser Walkon could never land a blow on the winner but did run right up to his best, pulling well clear of the rest of the field.

Al Ferof gave Paul Nicholls a first win in the race, and marked himself down as an obvious candidate for the King George, with the sharp three miles at Kempton looking well within his range given how well he'd seen out this stamina-sapping two and a half, but in the end he was forced to miss the rest of the 2012/13 season. He did go on to finish third in two King Georges, behind Silviniaco Conti in 2014 and behind Cue Card in 2015 (when trained by Dan Skelton) before he was retired with a leg injury in 2016.

Al Ferof's winning performance in the Paddy Power Gold Cup may well remain the best in the race since the turn of the century for many years to come, while his victory over Sprinter Sacre and Cue Card in the 2011 Supreme Novices' Hurdle is the stuff of Cheltenham Festival legend.