Festival winner Sky Pirate has Haldon Gold Cup on agenda

Jonjo O’Neill has earmarked the Haldon Gold Cup at Exeter as the most likely starting point for his Cheltenham Festival hero Sky Pirate.

The eight year old gelding was one of the success stories of last season following his trainer’s decision to drop him down to two miles mid-way through the campaign.

After opening his account over fences at Cheltenham in December, the Martin Tedham-owned son of Midnight Legend struck gold in two of his next three starts, culminating in victory in the Grade Three Johnny Henderson Grand Annual Challenge Cup at The Festival™.

Now O’Neill hopes his improving chaser can start the new season how he finished the last by taking another step forward and claiming victory in the Grade Two contest at the Devon track on November 2nd.

He said: “Sky Pirate schooled yesterday morning and he is grand. We will probably head for the Haldon Gold Cup all being well and see if he is good enough then take it from there.

“He has just done nothing but improve since going back to two miles, but you get horses like that and they sometimes just come right.

“I worked him one morning behind a couple of nice two milers so I thought we will give it a try over that trip and it worked.

“He did take me by surprise how he climbed through the ranks, but he is such a grand placid horse.”