After a relatively quiet week, Nick Scholfield has a busy weekend ahead with four rides booked at Taunton on Saturday. In his weekly blog he discusses tomorrow’s heavyweight clash betwen Defi de Seuil and Un de Sceaux, the year’s Cheltenham, the gold Cup and gives us an insight into this weekend’s booked rides.<\/p>\n
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The Clarence House Chase at Ascot on Saturday is obviously going to be another brilliant race between these two.<\/p>\n
Defi de Seuil showed what he can do at Sandown, although the track should suit Un de Sceaux who will probably like the ground. I think Un de Sceaux will definitely give him a very hard race and the conditions are in his favour. However, for me, Defi de Seuil will probably just come out on top.<\/p>\n
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I\u2019m hoping to be at Cheltenham this year if all goes well. Obviously we\u2019re still trying to qualify and it was disappointing that Tedham didn\u2019t qualify last weekend, missing out by one.<\/p>\n
At this time of year you\u2019re lining horses up but, because we\u2019ve had such a wet winter, a lot of the better ground horses will be waiting for it to dry up which is should do soon. The next couple of months will be key.<\/p>\n
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I think the Willie Mullins pair, for me, are the ones which are looking strong. After the way they performed last year, none of the English ones are jumping out.<\/p>\n
Obviously Clan Des Obeaux was impressive when going back to back in the King George but he was well beaten last year in the Gold Cup. Al Boum Photo looks mightily impressive as does Kemboy.<\/p>\n
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