Stratagem and Gesskille have been rated the leading British six-year-old point-to-pointers in the latest edition of The Yearbook.
The pair have been given a rating of 125 by Martin Harris, whose list of assessments will be published in the 2021/22 edition of The Yearbook. It is set to go on sale in time for the new season and is priced at £24.99 plus p&p. Contents include full results from last season, profiles of every horse who ran, plus a compilation of Nick Wilson’s On The Clock, a time-based analysis of races.
Gesskille, a son of Network, ran twice last season when winning hunters’ chases at Ludlow and Kempton for trainer Oliver Greenall and owners The Nevers Racing Partnership. He was subsequently raced in France, and picked up a Listed chase at Auteuill.
Stratagem raced from the stable of Paul Nicholls in the colours of owner/rider David Maxwell. The duo won at Ludlow and Southwell and were narrowly beaten at Warwick by Not That Fuisse.
Next on Harris’s list of six-year-olds was the Cherry Coward-trained Tom Cody, who won four point-to-points in a row and ended his season with a third in Hexham’s Heart of All England Hunters’ Chase. He has been allotted a mark of 119.
Vaucelet, (pictured above, nearest camera) trained in Northern Ireland by David Christie, was the leading seven-year-old, and by some margin. Second to Billaway in Punchestown’s Champion Hunters’ Chase, Vaucelet then returned to Stratford where he won the Pertemps Network Champion Hunters’ Chase, 12 months after landing the pointtopoint.co.uk Champion Novices’ Hunters’ Chase for the John Corbet Cup.
Harris awarded Vaucelet a rating of 137, and he placed Famous Clermont and Rose Of Arcadia equal second on 125. The Chris Barber-trained Famous Clermont won three point-to-points and an Exeter hunters’ chase, while the Colin Tizzard-trained mare Rose Of Arcadia was an impressive winner of two point-to-points under the trainer’s grandson, Freddie Gingell.
The mares Feuille De Lune and Latenightfumble, plus Fumet D’Oudairies, share a mark of 123.
Harris’s top-rated horse among all age groups is the Willie Mullins-trained Billaway, who has a rating of 143, two points clear of Winged Leader and Mighty Stowaway. The trio finished in that order in Cheltenham’s Festival Hunters’ Chase.
Famous Clermont, winning under Will Biddick at Buckfastleigh in January **photo Carl Evans