I really don’t know how, but somehow, we have reached the mid-point of the national hunt season; it has absolutely flown by. So, at this point we thought it would be a good idea to take stock of where we stand at bettrends and give a review of the season so far. We also look forward as we catapult towards the Spring Festivals, the upcoming release of The Cheltenham Festival Betting Guide and our final services for Cheltenham and Aintree.

Let’s make no bones about it, we had a tough start. Two losing weeks on the bounce meant we couldn’t be further from ‘getting off to a flier’, as we so wanted to be. In all fairness, it is always tough at the start of the season as horses are coming back from a break to begin their campaign. However, it was disappointing nonetheless with just the one winner across our first two weeks; we knew we had to pick up our form, and fast. Luckily, the Cheltenham Open Meeting was just around the corner and a real chance of picking up some profit across the three-day meeting for our first standalone service of the National Hunt season. As a lot of jumps fans, we love the Veterans’ Chases, and it has been a fantastic addition to the calendar. We began to love them even more when Magic Dancer (9/2) crossed the line in front at Cheltenham’s newly staged race to get our Open Meeting off the mark. The big race of the weekend, the Paddy Power Gold Cup, was another success for the bettrends team with Jamie Snowden’s Ga Law (13/2) landing the big pot. It wasn’t just winners that we were beginning to knock in though, but also big-priced places; our thought that Bourbali was far too big at 28/1 proved fruitful as he finished in the place money on Saturday. We did also have Nube Negra (1/10) in the winners’ enclosure but after the withdrawal of the only danger in Edwardstone, it wasn’t exactly a win to shout about! The bettrends team finished the Open Meeting Service with 5.8pts profit, a nice return but we knew we could build on this in future services.

Sandwiched in between the Open Meeting and our Winter Carnival service was a successful return to our scheduled VIP Weekly Tipping, in which No Cruise Yet (10/1) held on in game style in a race that had us on the edge of our seats. As mentioned earlier, the team knew they could build on a solid start to the standalone services; and that’s exactly what we did! It wasn’t all plain sailing though, after our first two selections finished out of the places it seemed like it was going to be a long weekend. That all changed when Paint The Dream (4/1) put in an emphatic performance to get us off the mark with a 14-length demolition victory. Our next selection was Champ (15/8) who battled gamely in a race-of-the-season contender to hold off Paisley Park close home in a finish that had our hearts pumping. The winners didn’t just stop there though, as the well-backed Abuffalosoldier (12/1) took home the lucky last to make it three straight winners to end the opening day of the Winter Carnival in fine style. The team were on cloud nine and a great weight-carrying performance from First Street (7/2) on the Saturday made it four winners from nine selections for the Winter Carnival. The result was a healthy 11.58pts of profit on the weekend.

It looked like we were finally finding our groove, or so we thought! The Festive Service began on a real low note, a rough opening weekend before the frost came along to ruin the party and caused abandonments galore the following couple of weeks. We had to bounce back from a slow start, and a 50/1 place in the closing bumper at Thurles was exactly what was needed. What followed was Boxing Day, a festive treat that is one of the best days in the racing calendar for many. With a gluttony of meetings and races across the UK and Ireland, we had to be selective in our picks though. Our first tip came in the Rowland Meyrick Chase at Wetherby, and it was agonising one. Sounds Russian (7/1) flew home and got our hopes up approaching the line, but just couldn’t reel in Into Overdrive. The winners were just around the corner though, with Harlem Soul (10/1) and Grey Dawning (5/2) leading the way to a successful Boxing Day and 6.7pts worth of profit for the day. New Year’s Day would not be as fruitful though, as we would give back some of that hard-earned profit unfortunately. Due to the abandonments we suffered throughout our Festive Service, we thought it would be right if we extended the service an extra week; and thankfully we did as we enjoyed our best day of the season yet! Any betting day will be a good one when you start with a 40/1 winner, and I Shut That D’Or landed our biggest-priced winner of the season in the Wincanton opener. The bettrends team then followed that up with further winners in O’Toole (10/3) and Beyond Redemption (11/2) to mark a fantastic day that resulted in a whopping 28.83pts of profit. What a brilliant way to close the Festive Service!

So there rounds up a fantastic first half to the season, despite a shaky start we really found our feet and now stand at 41.11pts in profit. We now need to look forward again though, as we begin the countdown to the major spring festivals. Paul Ferguson, along with a host of expert guest authors, is currently putting together the Cheltenham Festival Betting Guide for 2023. This complete guide to the Festival has every fact, stat and trend covered to help you make the most informed bets throughout the best week of the year. In 2022, the guide helped point readers in the direction of many winners from A Plus Tard to L’homme Presse and Brazil to State Man. Along with this, the bettrends team will be on hand with The Cheltenham Festival Service to help you cut through those big fields and find the value with our tried and tested in-depth race previews for every single race during the Festival. Hopefully, you will join us for the ride.