Caid Du Berlais

15th-Nov-2014

… I am also backing Caid Du Berlais this morning at 14/1 (as well as Buywise). I think that is too big. Paul Nicholls’ horse is very inexperienced over fences for a race like this but he does have the latent ability to win it.

He was a really progressive hurdler last season. Second in the Fred Winter Hurdle at the 2013 Cheltenham Festival, he ran a cracker to finish third in the Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys’ Handicap Hurdle at the 2014 Festival, so we know that he handles the track well.

We had him on side when he finished second in a big two-and-a-half-mile handicap hurdle at Aintree in April. This is his trip.

Rated 151 over hurdles, he has lots of scope off a mark of 143 over fences, especially given that he is a five-year-old who has raced just three times over the larger obstacles. Admittedly, he hasn’t reached the same level over fences yet – we also had him on side when he was well beaten in the Galway Plate last time – but he still has the potential to be that good.

He is not a bad jumper of fences and, if he can get even close to his hurdles form today, that should bring him very close. Soft ground is not a concern, he won on heavy ground in France, and he finished (an albeit fairly fortuitous) second in a Grade 1 hurdle at Chepstow on heavy ground as a juvenile.

CAID DU BERLAIS WON (ADV 14/1, SP 10/1)

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