When you find youself walking thru hell...keep on walking

"We shall heal our wounds, collect our dead and continue fighting" - Mao Tse Tung

I got home from work today to discover my only real winner of the week so far - that while I was at work the gents up in The Corkscrew had managed to deliver 3 cases of their finest wines to my house in my absence. There was a moment (and when I say moment I mean an hour) where I was tempted to turn off my phone, pull the curtains and lock the door and then spend from now til next Monday drinking myself through it but as Ali used to say - Don't quit, suffer now and live your life as a champion. So we fight on to try to salvage something from the wreckage of Cheltenham 2016

JLT:
If you asked 4 hours ago who I thought I would be backing here it would have been a very different answer but digging deeper into the form means Outlander and Bristol de Mai are actually 2 of the first I discounted. Maybe a bit harsh on Outlander to blame him for the tour of the British countryside that Bryan Cooper brought him on while he was trying to win the Neptune last year but put in his place by Shaneshill the next day and despite never being in danger of being beaten over fences over the winter never beat anything of note. Bristol de Mai is probably held by Garde La Victoire who has taken a slightly circuitous route here  since beating him in October but has won a hurdle over 2 1/2m around Cheltenham so the step back up in trip probably holds no fears. That said although a worthy favourite is only slight value @4/1 in a pretty open race. Black Hercules has never been a horse I've liked and once again priced off the hype rather than the ability. The 3 Musketeers will have his fans tomorrow but I think there's too much to forgive from his last run to just plough in off the run before. Kings Odessey is a dark horse who I think will outrun his odds but the horse I really want on side is L'Ami Serge. Since he has come to England the horse that have filled the runner up spot to him include - Kilcooley  (2nd best hurdles time speed this season) Killultagh Vic (nuff said) and Doctor Harper (we'll come to him later). He only managed 4th at the festival last year but the 3 horses that finished ahead of him have 2 wins and a second already this year. I'll forgive him for getting caught cold against Violet Dancer last time out who looked a real dark horse. He's been overlooked here so smash in.

L'Ami Serge 2pts e/w 9/1

Pertemps:
There is no quantity of wine that could make a man make sense of this race. If I was forced to have a bet I would go with Missed Approach who doesn't seem to like racing often but when he gets to the track he does show a decent level of form. Assuming he doesn't manage to fall out of the horsebox on the way to the track 11/1 seems alright that he'll come out on top

Ryanair:
Vautour should be winning the Gold Cup on Friday. Given he's not, he'll be winning this instead so pretty much trying to find who will be second here so I could try and make a case for 2 horse that should be tailed off in the Gold Cup behind him or an old aged pensioner but instead I'll take my chances with a young gun. Josses Hill beat Gods Own 8Ls the last day (roughly the amount he was beaten in the Champion Chase today) and can easily improve on last years showing. Will be very hard to keep him out of a place.

1.5pts Josses Hill 25/1

World Hurdle:

I should probably flag up in advance that in his career every race that Thistlecrack has run in I have lost cash...the more timid investors may now be running for cover and if you feel like skipping the next paragraph I can't really blame you. If you have kept reading you probably expect me to be talking up Martello which is kinda what I thought I would be doing about lunchtime but but Arbre de Vie and NMH have let down his form from last year today and even though I didn't worry too much about the run over Christmas as his last run back his last run was worrying. Alpha Des Obeuax look the only real danger to the favourite and having raced with the best of them over 2 1/2 he is now looking to take down the very soft 3m division. Think Thistlecrack sluices up but the only horse I see beating him is this guy

1pt e/w Alpha des Obeaux

After this we are running on fumes.. Smart Talk is one of the ew bets of the festivals arounds 7s, Stilletto is a good punt @10/1 and in the last the Doc Harper has ridiculous form being unlucky to come up against some of the best in the business and is rightly fav in the last