Days Hotel jumps well to claim Paddypower.com Chase
Days Hotel held his nerves in order to claim the Paddypower.com Chase at Sandown in England on Sunday, February 24, 2013. He was given a tough time by his competitors, but finished on top of the table rather comfortably in the end.
The eight-year-old gelding was rated as the outright favourite to succeed and entered the competition with a starting price of 5 to 4. The punters had shown immense confidence in his abilities and gambled a lot of money on him.
However, Realt Dubh seemed to be in threatening form until the final few moments of the race. He ran impressively and was jumping really well too. Despite that, he choked under pressure and failed to gain advantage of the momentum he had carried towards
the final fence.
The Irish challenger was in a great position to cause an upset, but lost his balance on the final fence, which put him out of contention of a victory. Luckily, he survived a fall and continued running to secure the runner up position at the end of the day.
His team would have been extremely disappointed though, as he had a chance to take the top spot.
On the other hand, Days Hotel made his team proud yet another time, as he was in complete control of the proceedings from the start until the end. Although he seemed to lack some speed at the straight, he jumped expertly to pressurise his opponents.
According to his trainer, Henry De Bromhead, “His jumping won him the race. I'm delighted, he did it the hard way, he went out and made it a real good gallop, jumping well the whole way. Paul Carberry looked to be going well at the last but our horse jumped
it great and got away from the fence very quickly.”
He went onto say, “He's won two Grade 2s now since he came back and just keeps improving. The Normans Grove Chase at Fairyhouse over Easter if there's ease in the ground would be the obvious race for him.”
This was overall the fourth chase victory for the talented runner, who seems to enjoy this format more than anything else.
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