Andy Holding is taking a short break before Christmas and so won't be publishing his daily racing tips column between the 21st and 25th December. He will be back on the 26th with tips including those for the Christmas Festival at Kempton.

Wednesday tips from our other daily columnist Steve Ryder can be found here.

While he's away you can read Holding's ante-post tips for the Cheltenham Festival, or his thoughts on the ‘seismic shift' in the 2023 Champion Chase market following the Tingle Creek Chase.

Finally, you can find ante-post previews from Architect Tips for Boxing Day’s King George VI Chase at Kempton Park and the Savills Chase on Wednesday 28th December at Leopardstown.

Andy Holding on the Cheltenham Gold Cup 2023

The Gold Cup price for PROTEKTORAT was a bit of an insult (since cut from 12/1 into 11s). It's almost as if the bookmakers haven’t given him the credit he deserves for winning that Betfair Chase and instead concentrated on A Plus Tard's demise. 

There are often reasons why horses run badly and people will draw the wrong conclusions when basically he was running in a very strong race in conditions he couldn't cope with. 

When you go back and do the time figures, it was almost like the Henry de Bromhead team had underestimated the opposition and what it took to win that race. Protektorat was on the money throughout the whole race; he jumped, he travelled and the figure he put up was sensational. 

We get time figures of that ilk about once every two or three years. And it wasn't a left field performance, he's always been capable of that level.