King George VI Chase 2025 – Early Thoughts
With the start of the 25/26 jumps season just around the corner, it’s a good time to look at the early markets for some of the season’s big races. There was plenty of value to be had for next year’s Cheltenham Festival when the markets first opened over six months ago, but the early birds have snaffled a lot of that. I have bets on Final Demand at 10/1 for the Brown Advisory (now 11/4), Wodhooh in the Mares Hurdle at 8/1 (now 4/1), and The New Lion in the Champion Hurdle at 7/1 (now 4/1), among others.
The lesson from this is to get in early! There have never been more column inches, podcasts and tips flying about on the big races. Fortunately, there is still a great chance to be the early worm when it comes to the King George, Kempton’s Boxing Day feature. Looking at the top of the market on Oddschecker, it’s easy to make a case for several of them not to be present and correct on the day.
Willie Mullins is going to be pulling out all the stops to win a third successive UK trainers' title. Surely, he won’t risk leaving it to the last minute again this year. He has some real firepower in the staying chase division with Galopin Des Champs, Fact to File, Gaelic Warrior and Lecky Watson. Quite a team, and that’s without Nick Rockett, last year’s Grand National hero, who could continue his upward trajectory. The first three are all prominent in the betting, and with his aspirations for a third title, I can see Willie getting involved. However, I think he will keep both Galopin Des Champs and Fact to File at home and rely on Gaelic Warrior as his main hope. Kempton could be tailor-made for the horse, who still tends to jump right at some of his fences. His win in a sub-standard soft-ground Arkle fooled them into thinking they had a Queen Mother Chase prospect on their hands, but by the end of last season, it was clear for all to see he was more a stayer than a speed horse.
Inothewayurthinkin and Jonbon are two more horses from the head of the market that are unlikely to turn up, so who does that leave? Il Est Francais for starters. He’s recently relocated to Tom George’s yard from France and will surely have the King George as his number one target for the season. He loves Kempton and went very close in the race last season. He could be about to peak as a 7yo. Who else? Banbridge, last year’s winner, has to be worth thinking about, but he’s run poorly twice since and is very ground dependent, so not ideal as an ante-post proposition. Jukebox Jury is interesting. Ben Pauling’s exciting novice won the Kauto Star Novices’ Chase at the track before succumbing to a season-ending injury. If he returns fit and well, he will be of interest, but for ante-post purposes, we can perhaps afford to sit on our hands for a while yet.
The two standout bets for me as we move into October are:
Gaelic Warrior 6/1
Il Est Francais 16/1 ew