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A Cheltenham Festival Review by Mike Vince

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So what planet are we on?

The reason I ask is simple, I am just back from a wonderful, if professionally challenging, week at the Cheltenham Festival, where once again the Irish did a Veni Vidi Vici job on the hapless Brits- and they even gave us a race on the first day by failing to turn up.

The ‘Holy Trinity’ of the big trio stayed at home thanks to the exploits of Buveur D’Air, Altior (one of the all time greats in waiting) and Native River but practically everything else went green- and in the likes of Footpad, Samcro and Laurina the Irish have young horses, already Cheltenham winners who promise to get even better.

48 hours after the last race, with the glorious tones of a nation in song to ‘The Fields of Athenry’ having moved from Gloucestershire up the A40 to Twickenham- passing a load of broken down chariots who have swung so low their wheels have fallen off- comes the news Cheltenham is unraceable because of snow.

Yes- three days after the Ides of March!!

I’m lucky. Cheltenham is like no other – superb week thanks to the willing assistance of trainers and jockeys who don’t avoid a microphone and without whom I couldn’t do the job- so Big Thank You’s all round.

But it is also the sports shop window, and the lack of success (again) against the Green Armada should be prompting some serious talk of how the balance can be redressed.

But it won’t. The talk, quite simply is of ‘The Beast from the East’ promoting Siberia Hysteria.

How much is a ticket to Planet Reality?

by Mike Vince 

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