Can you believe it? There are only another 360 days to go until the start of the Cheltenham Festival!!! I can only consider the 2015 running of the greatest jumps meeting in the world as an enormous success – two winners for the yard is precisely double what I would have settled for at the beginning of the meeting and with a further three finishing runner-up it has to be considered a job well done and I would like to extend my grateful thanks to my owners, stable sponsors Bathwick Tyres for their continued support and my team at Pond House for their efforts.

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Unsurprisingly given it was the final week before the Cheltenham Festival, last week was a quiet one on the runners front with just Great Choice running at Exeter on Tuesday prior to a handful of runners at Sandown during their two day meeting and a sole runner at Chepstow on Saturday.

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It was another good week for the stable with four more winners taking us through the magical century mark for the season. At the start of each campaign I always set myself a clear and challenging goal – 100 winners, £1 million in prize money and a Cheltenham Festival winner. If I satisfy all of those objectives I consider it to be a very successful season. To some a Cheltenham winner is not the be-all and end-all, although it is the very pinnacle of our sport – the Olympics of racing if you like, and so I would be surprised if any of my counterparts did not aspire to winning at the Festival.

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The countdown to the Cheltenham Festival continues apace and it is hard to believe that as I write this there is only a fortnight to go. Predictably it is going to be a frenetic two weeks as I put the finish preparations for the horses, decide upon the most suitable target for each and that is before I get onto the Cheltenham Preview tour that also starts next week. This year I will be appearing on the panel for the Saunton Sands Hotel (2nd March), Exeter racecourse (3rd March) and Taunton racecourse (6th March), as well as conducting a telephone interview for the Scottish preview on 3rd March.

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Another good week for the stable was bookended by wins at Plumpton on Monday and an across the card treble at Ascot and Haydock on Saturday. A total of five winners during the course of the week took our seasonal tally to 94 and now with only three weeks to go until the start of the Cheltenham Festival, we are putting the finishing touches to the horses’ preparations and just keeping everything ticking over and all our fingers and toes firmly crossed!

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Unless you have been living on a different planet over the past seven days, you will no doubt be aware that there have been some major racing stories, some of which have caused ripples in the ante-post markets for the Cheltenham Festival and others that have sent shockwaves throughout the entire racing fraternity.

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Extremely testing ground was the order of the week last week but that could not prevent the horses from continuing to perform well and a further five winners took our seasonal tally to 85 with just five weeks to go until the start of the 2015 Cheltenham Festival. With more early closing entries for the Festival and a visit from a renowned member of the racing press, it certainly was a busy but rewarding week.

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As we approach the end of January I am pleased to report that the horses remain in good order and continue to perform creditably on the racecourse. Another three runners last week bears testament to this and our seasonal tally now stands at 80. Indeed, my parents have just returned from their holidays and during their absence the Pond House team have enjoyed nine successes…perhaps I should ask them to go on holiday a little more often? I don’t think my mother would mind, although my father may have other ideas!

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Another three winners last week means that the seasonal tally continues to tick along nicely and as I write we have enjoyed 77 winners this term. It wasn’t just a good week for us however; it was a monumental one for stable jockey Tom Scudamore who recorded his fastest one hundred winners at Newbury on Wednesday, beating his previous best by over two and a half months. With plenty of entries for the week ahead, including Trials day at Cheltenham this weekend, it is certainly a very exciting time of the year.

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Last week was certainly a productive one! Thankfully our case of seconditis cleared up and three winners meant that our seasonal tally ticked over to 74. Meanwhile we were also busy making entries for some of the big races for the Cheltenham Festival including the centrepiece, The Cheltenham Gold Cup. With further races closing tomorrow, for all the latest news on our Cheltenham team as well as all the other goings-on in the yard, read on…

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