Champion Chase Preview - Festival Focus

Super Sprint - The defending champ can make it back to back wins if he arrives healthy 

Like last year the Champion Chase preview is undoubtedly going to be the briefest of my Festival Focus pieces because simply put if a healthy Sprinter Sacre turns up he wins doing handstands.

Obviously he’s not the sure thing he was last year having only raced once this year and lost his unbeaten record over fences, however there were of course mitigating circumstances.

Pulled up after only a handful of fences by Barry Geraghty the man who knows him like the back of his hand due to having not jumped with his usual exuberance, Sprinter Sacre was found after the race to be suffering from an irregular heartbeat, similar to what ailed the mighty Denman a few years back.

His future participation in any race was immediately called in to doubt but he was quite quickly announced to be healthy again and has been building up towards a tilt at retaining his Queen Mother crown ever since.