Punchestown festival tips: Wednesday's best bets from Racing Post experts

Day two of the Punchestown festival is upon us – but who do our top tipsters fancy most?

Freedom To Dream

By Graeme Rodway

Race: Connolly's RED MILLS Irish EBF Auction Hurdle Series Final (4.15)

Odds: 5-2

Trainer Peter Fahey and owner Paul Leech won this race last year with Suprise Package and it has likely been Freedom To Dream's target since he broke his maiden at the course in November.

Freedom To Dream has kept hot company since. He was second in a Grade 2 at Limerick over Christmas and his last two runs are probably the best individual pieces of form on offer.

Fils D'Oudairies

By Robbie Wilders

Race: Louis Fitzgerald Hotel Hurdle (4.45)

Odds: 2-1

Nicky Henderson's Punchestown runners are always worth noting (3-8 in the last five seasons) and Fils D'Oudairies's last-time-out second to the thrown-in Langer Dan in a Grade 3 at Aintree, in which there was eight lengths back to the third, is the standout piece of form in the Louis Fitzgerald Hotel Hurdle.

Minella Crooner

By David Jennings

Race: Irish Mirror Novice Hurdle (5.20)

Odds: 9-2

Having convinced myself Minella Crooner was the best bet of the entire Cheltenham Festival, his absence from the Albert Bartlett due to a pulled muscle was a big blow to my ante-post portfolio.

Gordon Elliott has obviously been happy with his recovery or else he wouldn't be showing up in the Irish Mirror Novice Hurdle (5.20) and I am still of the opinion he is the standout staying novice hurdler this season.

Read more Wednesday previews:

5.20 Punchestown: The Nice Guy puts unbeaten record on the line as Albert Bartlett 1-2-3 clash

5.55 Punchestown: unmissable insight from connections on a 'red-hot' Punchestown Gold Cup

6.30 Punchestown: Cheltenham hero Facile Vega renews rivalry with American Mike

7.05 Punchestown: 'A revelation over fences' - Ciel De Neige in frame to hand Mullins a winner

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