Andy Holding's Tuesday Racing Tips

The recent form figures of SHAMAR (best price 13-2) don’t look that inspiring, but there have been mitigating circumstances attached to several of those performances and he wouldn’t have raced in a contest as bad as this for a while, so there’s a decent chance he will justify the trip over the Irish Sea. Not getting the clearest of runs when running better than his finishing position suggested at the Galway Festival back in August, the son of Dr Fong then consented to run off the track at an early juncture on his next visit to Ballybrit three days later.

All dressed up with nowhere to go at Navan on his latest outing, the nine-year-old finished off his race to suggest he would have been a serious contender with a clear run and given that he ran well on his last visit to these shores over 1m 5f on soft ground at Ayr back in May, he rates a tempting proposition off the same mark with conditions to suit.

The two classy four-year-old’s from last year add a bit of glamour to this Grade B handicap hurdle and it probably boils down to which one of the pair is fit enough to plough their way through the heavy ground on their first outings of the season. Ex Patriot easily brings the best form to the table, but shouldering top weight under testing conditions won’t be easy, whereas PROSPECTUS (best price 9-1) will relish the prospect and at the morning prices rates the value bet. On the two occasions he scored as a juvenile, Gavin Cromwell’s inmate showed an abundant amount of stamina on proper winter ground and his only really modest run came when he failed to cut much ice on a quicker surface in the Fred Winter at the Cheltenham Festival. Although connections would have liked to have got a run into him prior to today’s contest, the fact that he was down to run on the Flat the other day at Killarney suggests he should be at least fit enough to do himself justice and with the useful conditional Donal McInerney on board, he makes plenty of each-way appeal.