Noble Yeats: how is the Grand National winner after his Auteuil mishap?

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In Friday's email Chris reflects on last season's Grand National winner's trip to Auteuil with his owner Robert Waley-Cohen –and subscribers can get more great insight, tips and racing chat from Chris every Monday to Friday.

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The good news is that the Grand National winner is okay after an abortive trip to France on Saturday. It's always a thrill when the latest Aintree hero returns to the track but the excitement was brief this time; Noble Yeats put in a short one at the second, causing James Reveley to call a cab, was a bit sticky over the third and that was basically it. Pulled up after a minute.

"He seems in good order, got over it all right," says his owner, Robert Waley-Cohen, after chewing things over with trainer Emmet Mullins. "It takes quite a lot out of a horse, doing all that travelling, but anyhow he seems to be all right.

"He either took a false step or slipped, coming into the fence, and then the whole thing went slightly haywire. He ended up not coming up when James wanted, put in a short one. . . then the horse didn't jump the next one very well and James thought, has he pulled a muscle or something?

"He said, I had to pull him up, just in case he'd damaged himself, and of course he hadn't. There you go.

"It was very frustrating because I wanted to find out if he could handle those fences. Maybe he just didn't take to them. Maybe the jockey doesn't on with the horse, who knows? There's a million things that can go wrong and you have to get everything right."

Waley-Cohen and Mullins have been discussing where to go next and no decision has been made but the owner mentions the option which is seemingly uppermost in his mind: the Coral Gold Cup, better known by its previous names, the Hennessy and then the Ladbrokes Trophy.

"It would be interesting because you would find out whether the horse had improved a bit or couldn't run up to his handicap mark. You're in a funny place on 158 because you're not up there with the best conditions horses and you're very high in the handicap, so it's hard to get a result."

Could Noble Yeats prove to be a Gold Cup horse this winter? Much depends on your view of his Grand National effort. Was it the first time we saw the extent of his ability, or a career peak which he can't repeat away from Aintree?

"He could have had a fantastically blessed run. I'm totally prejudiced about the quality of the ride." That's because the owner's son, Sam, was aboard, famously turning the very last ride of his career into his biggest moment.

"The jockey never asked him to do anything clever at the fences, made sure he had plenty of room and could see them, grabbed the inside at the critical moments. I think it was a remarkable ride, with many years of experience coming into play."

Now that Noble Yeats seems a much better horse than was thought, did Sam consider putting off retirement for another year? Definitely not, says his father.

"The trouble is, you get to a point where it's great fun riding on the big occasions on a really good horse but it's not fun doing all the prep work. He's working enormously hard all week, travelling a huge amount and he has a family and small children that he wants to pay attention to at the weekend. He can't run a diary based on: 'We might run on Thursday'.

"He'll go racing lots, I should think. He absolutely loves it, he's still riding out and schooling."

Naturally, the thrill of ownership will be diminished for Waley-Cohen, now that it's not his son in the saddle. But he has been here before.

"After I stopped trying to ride incompetently and got jockeys on board, we had a lot of fun. We had a couple of Cheltenham Festival winners, Rustle and Katarino, and Won't Be Gone Long won a Topham with Richard Dunwoody on board.

Hardy Du Mesnil at the sales prior to his Newbury stable debutCredit: Arqana

"That was huge fun and I've no doubt it'll be huge fun again." He mentions the Olly Murphy-trained five-year-old Hardi Du Mesnil as "an outstanding athlete" he's looking forward to seeing. There's a caveat, familiar to owners: "Whether he can do it on the racecourse, we don't really know."

So there is a vacancy in Noble Yeats's saddle. Can he say who is likely to fill it?

"I do have someone in mind for him, who I talked to Emmet about and we're just trying to finalise things with that jockey. I don't want to reveal who, in case they say no or can't do it."

Noble Yeats is the first horse he has had with Mullins and, of course, he's a fan, just as some FrontRunner readers may be after victory for Secret Secret on Wednesday. "We get on really well, have a lot of fun. He's a very shrewd and skillful trainer."

Friday's picks

The whole point of a Cheltenham card (yay, Cheltenham!) is to find a horse that's slipped under the radar of the betting market. I think that might be Glentruan (3.55), sent by Ann Duffield for the 2m4f handicap hurdle.

I sense that Duffield's name on a racecard still does not grab punters by the throat but let's not forget that her 28-1 shot in the Swinton came home six lengths clear. Her jumpers are 4/14 since the start of August.

Glentruan made a winning handicap debut on his first start for Duffield at Ayr in December - albeit he dead-heated. He travelled strongly but didn't get home next time at Wetherby, soon after which he had a wind op. This is his first appearance since.

He comes from a useful family (MacGeorge and Chief Dan George are in there) and his sister won for Gordon Elliott in August off a mark 5lb below the one which Glentruan has today.

Given that Glentruan might not love soft, this may have been the plan for some time, rather than a first run back on the way somewhere else. He's interesting at 22-1, with 25s in places.

A much more obvious choice at 9-4 is Pull Again Green (3.20) in the small-field novice handicap chase that precedes that race. All five runners have more to offer but Fergal O'Brien's runner has masses of potential on his fencing debut and comes from a yard in form, as it generally is in late October.

Paul Kealy has tips for Cheltenham and Newbury.

Three things to look out for today . . .

1. There are quite a few interesting debutants at Newbury and Doncaster, presumably horses who have needed time and/or want a bit of cut. Vasilissa is among them, being a Kingman half-sister to Heredia, who beat 27 rivals in the Sandringham Handicap at Royal Ascot this summer. Vasilissa represents the same connections of owner/breeders St Albans Bloodstock, trainer Richard Hannon and jockey Sean Levey. She's in a big field for , a maiden race over an extended six furlongs. Heredia won twice as a juvenile, including at Newbury on good to soft.

2.An hour later, Torito is possibly the most interesting of Frankie Dettori's five mounts at Newbury. Also by Kingman, he's a half-brother to six winners, including Journey, a Group 1 winner on Champions Day 2016. Journey took five runs to find a winning opportunity but Torito has another couple of siblings who won their first two races. He holds a Derby entry and represents the same connections (Strawbridge / Gosden / Dettori) as Journey.

3.Uhtred has his first race for new connections in which is second on Cheltenham's card. The seven-year-old, who hacked up on his first attempt over fences at Downpatrick in August when with Joseph O'Brien, was among those sent to the sales by Gigginstown soon after and was bought by Craig and Laura Buckingham for £32,000. He's now with Dan Skelton and it will be fascinating to see how he measures up against some smart prospects. He was close up in the Royal Bond until the penultimate flight last year.

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The Front Runner is our latest email newsletter available exclusively to Members' Club Ultimate subscribers. Chris Cook, a four-time Racing Reporter of the Year award winner, provides his take on the day's biggest stories and tips for the upcoming racing every morning from Monday to Friday. Not a Members' Club Ultimate subscriber? Click here to join today and also receive our Ultimate Daily emails plus our full range of fantastic website and newspaper content