Festival Focus - Queen Mother Champion Chase 2015

Festival Fever - Champagne Fever can enhance his fine festival record in the Champion Chase.

With the exception of the Champion Hurdle in which realistically there’s probably only three horses that can win it – and even then I’m firmly in the Faugheen is a machine camp – the championship races at this year’s Cheltenham festival are all as wide open as I’ve ever known them.

No championship race though is perhaps more intriguing than the Champion Chase which will see the last two winners finally lock horns properly after both returning from lengthy absences.

Throw in to the mix a couple of young upstarts from the mighty Paul Nicholls as well as a horse campaigned over further this term but now dropping back to a trip he has a second to none festival record over and you have all the ingredients for an explosive showdown.

For many though the race revolves around whether Sprinter Sacre and Sire De Grugy are still the forces of old.