Evan Williams targeting £100,000 windfall as Paddy Power confirm Imperial bonus

New Imperial Cup sponsors Paddy Power are offering a £100,000 bonus to connections of the horse who wins next Saturday's handicap at Sandown and follows up in any race at the Cheltenham Festival – and Evan Williams has his eyes on the jackpot with ante-post favourite Mack The Man.

The David Pipe-trained Gaspara was the last horse to complete the double in 2007, winning the Fred Winter three days after her Sandown success, while his father Martin also pulled off the feat with Blowing Wind (1998 County Hurdle) and five years earlier with Olympian, who went on to land the Coral Cup.

He is a horse Williams, who trains not far from Cardiff, remembers fondly.

"I want to win the bonus – I'll be brutally honest with you," he said.

Evan Williams: eyes on the prizeCredit: Phil Mingo

"I had quite a lot to do with Olympian and I've always found the bonus an interesting angle with the horse. It's great for the public's imagination going into Cheltenham and, while I'm not saying I'm going to do it, I'd love to have a crack.

"Thinking back, Olympian is one of those stories. The favourite for the Imperial Cup is willing to have a crack at the bonus and I've always wanted to have a horse to try and do that."

"Mack The Man would have to win to get into the County Hurdle and the bonus makes it more attractive.

The Rucker family's Mack The Man is the 11-2 favourite with the sponsors for the Imperial Cup and was a smooth winner of a course-and-distance handicap under Adam Wedge in December. He was brought down, when still in contention, in the Betfair Hurdle at Newbury last time.

Williams added: "He'll run in the Imperial Cup and he's come out of Newbury grand. He's had a couple of schools since the last day when he got a bit of a bump when brought down. He schooled on Wednesday and everything was good, he's in A1 condition."

Asked if he thought the progressive six-year-old would have won at the Berkshire track, Williams replied: "I'll tell you a week on Saturday! Being serious though, plenty of them had a chance jumping the last and we were one of them."

Paddy Power's bonus – which has been offered by previous bookmakers under their sponsorship of the race – will be split with £40,000 going to the winning owner(s), £20,000 to the trainer, £20,000 to the yard and £20,000 to the jockey(s).

2016 Imperial Cup winner Flying Angel was another who went close to the double, finishing second in that year's Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys' Handicap Hurdle.

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