A small field by historic standards for a race often run on winter ground, hopefully the forecast Cloud will remain to stop any "Low sun" nonsense.

 

A few of these would definitely prefer softer Going, a few will be into uncharted territory stamina wise and although the firmer ground may help they still have to run up that incredibly steep hill to the finish a couple of times.

 

At the prices and taking everything into consideration I narrowed down to 3 horses and just left out D'Jango who won a 6 runner race last time at big odds and one we've tracked for a year. I prefer in these conditions his stablemate GWENCILY BERBAS a Course and Distance winner off a mark of 124 on Good to Soft, ran a 5th in the Eider chase a year ago over an extended 4 miles on Good ground and only tired when getting to the 4 mile mark, IF its not run off its feet early I think it can run a place at least here at decent Odds. 

 

I think that is anything is going to take this on from the front, set the fractions and stay there it is FAVOURI DE SIVOLA as that's exactly what it did in December on decent ground over Course and Distance off a mark of 115, it runs off 120 here and the run style and previous CD win suggests that the extra 5lbs won't be an excuse for not repeating the run. So we have a prominent one and one who can stay on and on. I'd normally have one selection with 9 runners but these pair cover the tactical pace options very well and if there are 9 runners or 15 runners, we'd still likely get Odds to 3rd place which is what we're looking at value wise

 

The 3 at the top of the market are the disappointing Copperhead and Raddon Top and Gazette Bourgeoise who all have stamina to prove in the final 1/2 mile up the hill.