Coral Cup Tips & Predictions
The Coral Cup is the first handicap on Day 2 of the Cheltenham Festival, and it’s always a competitive affair.
You need a unique blend of experience as well as an unexposed profile, making it one of toughest races of the entire week from a punting point of view.
Three trainers have won it twice in the last 10 years, and all three of them will be represented again this year. Dan Skelton will be looking to complete the hat trick, having won the last two renewals with fan favourite Langer Dan.
A maximum field of 26 is set to line up, which gives us plenty to ponder, and we’ve picked out three horses to follow, including an unexposed outsider for Henry de Bromhead.
NAP: Impose Toi @ 15/2
Nicky Henderson has been very careful with Impose Toi and connections clearly didn’t want his mark to rise after he won comfortably at Newbury in November.
A fair handicapper last year, he won a novice handicap hurdle here in November 2023 and followed that up with a fine second behind stablemate Luccia in a valuable handicap at Ascot a month later.
Better jumps at the last two flights would have yielded a different result and the form has worked out well, with the winner placing in the Champion Hurdle and the third is a progressive handicapper these days.
It’s easy to forgive his below-par third at Kempton after that as most of the yard’s runners were in appalling form and he’s definitely better than that.
Having returned to winning ways last time out, confidence will be high and there should be more to come, despite a 7lb rise in the weights.
NB: Jimmy Du Seuil @ 12/1
Jimmy Du Seuil chased Ballyburn home in a Grade 1 novice hurdle here last season and he’s surely an interesting player in handicap company on that evidence.
It’s telling that we haven’t seen him yet this season and his last run was at the Dublin Racing Festival in fact.
He kept some good company as a novice and wasn’t disgraced when fourth behind the excellent Brighterdaysahead over 2m4f at Aintree in April.
Willie Mullins’ gelding won a maiden hurdle in good style at Clonmel in January 2024 and was comfortably clear of useful stablemate Ile Atlantique when second to Ballyburn at Cheltenham.
This horse has a very interesting profile, but this is his handicap debut, so it will be a new experience for him.
That being said, he could be unexposed on a mark of 146, and he looks like the most interesting of the Mullins-trained trio that line up here.
Also consider: Beckett Rock @ 20/1
Henry de Bromhead hasn’t had the best of seasons by his own exceptional standards, but he knows how to train a Cheltenham Festival winner and lightly raced novice Beckett Rock is an intriguing candidate, with Darragh O’Keefe set to take the ride.
Rachael Blackmore rides stablemate Ballyadam, who was second to Langer Dan last year, but the 10-year-old is pretty exposed, and O’Keefe’s mount gets the nod.
He appreciated the step up to 2m4 when runner-up in a handicap hurdle at Fairyhouse last time out and, as De Bromhead is involved, further improvement could well be on the agenda.
View all Cheltenham Festival markets
Odds correct at time of publication but subject to fluctuation