Why the focus on Galopin Des Champs? This is the best Gold Cup in years

In the precise moment that Rachael Blackmore started niggling at A Plus Tard down the back straight in November's Betfair Chase, you could understand why the Gold Cup would all of a sudden become centred on Galopin Des Champs.

Over the summer, A Plus Tard, the defending champion, and last season's top novice Galopin Des Champs had dominated the Gold Cup betting, roughly 3-1 each and thereby taking nearly half the book between them. So a slip from one clearly put the other in pole position. But the challengers started queueing up within minutes of Blackmore sending out those first warning signs, and they have not stopped coming.

Protektorat won the Betfair Chase, producing a Racing Post Rating of 175 that would have been good enough to win a significant minority of recent Gold Cups. Grand National winner Noble Yeats won the Many Clouds two weeks later, showing 10lb of improvement and crossing the 170 threshold little more than 15 months after his chasing debut. Then at Christmas Bravemansgame won the King George by 14 lengths.