We make a twin-attack at winning a third Greatwood Hurdle at Cheltenham on Sunday

November 14

Alan has won the prestigious Greatwood Hurdle twice in the last eight years, courtesy of Elgin and Harambe, and he is doubly-represented in Sunday’s feature at Cheltenham with Castle Carrock and Helnwein.

It was only a year ago yesterday that Castle Carrock made his racecourse debut, justifying favouritism in a bumper at Ayr when trained by Nicky Richards.

He changed hands afterwards for £100,000 and joined the Barbury team, winning his novice hurdle at the first time of asking for us in soft ground at Sandown, so he won’t be inconvenienced should underfoot conditions deteriorate further at Cheltenham.

Alan said:”I probably made a mistake running Castle Carrock in the Grade 1 at Aintree’s Grand National meeting as the handicapper put him up 6lb for finishing sixth.

“Ideally, he wants two and a half miles and Kelso, where he ran his second race for us, would have been plenty sharp enough a track for him, but this looks the right race to start him back.

“We also run Helnwein, and, though we’ll probably have another crack at chasing with him at some stage, he runs well fresh, so this race should tell us which route we should take.

“Helnwein would not want the ground to get any softer, but he is an early and late season horse and I was really pleased how well he ran in the Swinton Hurdle at Haydock.”