Do you want to know a secret? Let it be Imperial Cup day

This is the day racecourse managers remember Brenda Holloway and the King Curtis Band, Cannibal & The Headhunters, Sounds Incorporated, and the Young Rascals.

Can't quite recall those names? You're probably not alone. They were the support acts who opened the show at the Beatles' legendary concert at Shea Stadium in 1965.

It cannot have been fun playing to 50,000 screaming fans, a whole lot of whom were probably desperate for you to get off the stage and make way for the main attraction.

Which must be how it feels to host a decent racemeeting just three days before the Cheltenham Festival.

No matter how hard you try, no matter how good a show you put on – those Rascals had three US number ones and are in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame – you fear the nation's punters are impatiently drumming their fingers and waiting for the Fab Four days.

That's not how it used to be for the Imperial Cup, which was the most important hurdle race of the season in the first part of the last century – until it was overtaken by the founding of the Champion Hurdle in 1927 at you-know-where.

Sandown and the sponsors nowadays embrace the elephant in the room rather than trying to ignore it and have usually offered a bonus if the winner scores at the festival a few days later.

New backers Matchbook have reinstated that £50,000 enticement to Cheltenham entries – and been rewarded with a turnout of just 13.

That was a decidedly unlucky number for punters as only one of the top four in the ante-post betting made the final field.

But the lack of opposition will have gone down well at Pond House, the Somerset winner factory which clearly sees the Imperial Cup as a race to target.

Martin Pipe and his son David have won it nine times between them, with Olympian, Blowing Wind and Gaspara all going on to land the Cheltenham bonus.

Which is rather to suggest that the yard's Max Do Brazil, a £160,000 buy who holds three festival entries, can probably be expected to improve on his British debut at Cheltenham, where market support suggested he hadn't been bought for his funky name.

But also keep an eye on Gassin Golf, who was second in this in 2014 and third in 2015 – when he finished a couple of places ahead of a certain Thistlecrack.

Yet the race designed to throw up future stars is the EBF Matchbook VIP 'National Hunt' Novices' Handicap Hurdle Final.

This is the culmination of a nationwide talent search, with qualifiers up and down Britain in a series that bars Flat horses and seeks out high-class jumpers in the making.

The good news is that it's certainly doing its job, with star names Dynaste, Many Clouds and Whisper all contesting the final in the last few years.

The bad news, for punters at least, is that each of that highly talented trio was beaten here – picking a good horse is not always enough and this is invariably a horribly trappy heat. Don't necessarily bank on it as a source for next week's betting bank.

Big day at Dunstall Park

Of course, there is no Flat racing at Cheltenham – yet – so festival fever has no impact on the action as Wolverhampton stages its biggest meeting of the year.

If anything, the £151,000 up for grabs on the Tapeta was too popular and eliminations were needed in both feature races.

Doncaster's kick-off to the turf season is the looming target and Brian Ellison runs money-spinning trio Baraweez, Dream Walker and Top Notch Tonto – who have earned more than £900,000 between them – in the sunbets.co.uk Lincoln Trial.

And there would be no more fitting winner of the track's only Listed race than a man who nearly lost his livelihood there in 2015.

Connor Beasley: looks to have every chance on My Target in the Lady Wulfruna StakesCredit: Grossick Racing 07710461723

Connor Beasley suffered a horrific fall that left him with a fractured skull, neck and back, cost him half an ear, smashed his teeth and required him to spend three months in a custom-fitted body brace.

Yet he fought his way back to return in March of last year, proved himself as good a jockey as ever – if not better – and has every chance in the sunbets.co.uk Lady Wulfruna Stakes on the much-improved My Target.

On the eve of a meeting that remembers the late JT McNamara by naming the National Hunt Chase in his honour, it's timely to recall the risks jockeys take every day – there are many worse fates than just being upstaged.

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