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Key events

Coral Handicap Chase (Chepstow, 1.05pm) result

1 Lowry’s Bar 11/10 fav
2 Can You Call 5/1

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Coral Handicap Chase (Chepstow, 1.05pm)

And they’re off … Lowry’s Bar leads the field over the first fence … Fidelio Vallis is up with the leaders and Le Milos is last in the early stages … they’ve run into the mist now … Le Milos has reappeared in second place! … Lowry’s Bar has managed to hold on but saw very little of that I’m afraid!!

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Ladbrokes Handicap Hurdle (Kempton, 1.20pm) betting

  • Larchmont Lass 11/4

  • Royale Margaux 3/1

  • Della Casa Lunga 9/2

  • Pawapuri 13/2

  • West Balboa 9/1

  • Fortuna Ligna 10/1

  • Holly Hartingo 11/1

  • Looking As You Are 22/1

  • NR – The Lord Maid

  • Odds vis BestofBets.com

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Greg Wood

Ladbrokes Handicap Hurdle (Kempton, 1.20pm) preview

The fact that Dan Skelton has declared the 141-rated West Balboa for this mares’ race means that three of the eight runners are “out of the handicap” – ie. carrying the minimum weight of 10st 2lb when their actual rating would see them carrying at least 3lb less, and 6lb less in the case of Fortuna Ligna at the foot of the weights. That clearly puts the five at the top of the list at something of an advantage, and while West Balboa is clearly the classiest horse in the race, I’m not entirely convinced that she will be able to give 21lb to Tom Symonds’s Royale Margaux. She has shown improved form over hurdles on her last two starts, did well to get within four lengths of the winner after finding trouble in running at Cheltenham last time and can race off the same mark here.

SELECTION: ROYALE MARGAUX

Foggy times at Kempton! Photograph: Zac Goodwin/PA
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Chepstow racing is a bit delayed so bear with if the betting, previews and reports are a little scrunched together today … and if the news of action on the details of the races are less detailed than usual. It’s hard to see for racegoers, commentators and TV viewers alike at all the tracks!

Racegoers in the enclosure as horses walk in the parade ring at Chepstow. Photograph: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images
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It’s also pretty foggy at Kempton …

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Things are improving at Chepstow where you can now see the final fence/hurdle down the home straight.

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Coral Handicap Chase (Chepstow, 1.05pm) betting

Can’t see much at Chepstow. Photograph: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images
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Greg Wood

Greg Wood

Coral Handicap Chase (Chepstow, 1.05pm) preview

Just seven runners in the opening race on the ITV card and a very popular favourite in Lowry’s Bar, who does rather leap off the page as he has made a very promising start to his chasing career and has much more scope for further progress through the ratings than most of his rivals. He was a 5-2 chance overnight, however, and has been backed down to around 5-4 this morning, so any value in his price is long gone. Georges Saint will make some appeal as an each-way alternative as a result, as he has gone well fresh in the past and Venetia Williams, his trainer, is in sparkling form, but the scratching of Nocte Volatus from the original eight declarations means that the bookies are now only paying two places.

SELECTION: LOWRY’S BAR

Jockeys and trainers inspect the course at Chepstow with stewards as heavy fog surrounds them. Photograph: David Davies/PA
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“Stewards will continue to monitor conditions as each race takes place,” reports Hayley Moore at Chepstow, after officials gave the go-ahead for racing to go on at the Welsh track, currently shrouded in fog.

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According to former BBC racing correspondent Cornelius Lysaght racing at Chepstow will continue … though let’s hope that doesn’t prove a controversial call.

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Jockey Gavin Sheehan, who won the first race at Chepstow on Julius Des Picton, told At The Races presenter Hayley Moore about riding out on the track: “It’s not ideal … you can’t see the hurdles until you are close to them!” An inspection is being held now to see if racing can go ahead.

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Chepstow inspect for Welsh National meeting

This just in … Chesptow have called an inspection owing to thick fog at the track!

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Good morning. Loved the title of the opening race of the day at Leopardstown … the Paddy Power I Have No Idea What Day It Is Maiden Hurdle. Seems very appropriate. I much prefer when Christmas Day is on a Sunday (the day people traditionally don’t do much and ha a roast dinner) – you know where you are then. Shopping on Saturday (Christmas Eve) and sport on a Monday (Boxing Day) followed by life getting somewhere back to normal. But the horror is that the next Sunday Christmas Day is not until 2033!

Anyway, back from existential dread to the action. What was perhaps most interesting about that Leopardstown race is another defeat for a Willie Mullins runner who wasn’t sighted after hardly being well supported in the betting. Chris Cook wrote in his email to Racing Post subscribers this morning that Mulllins hardly had a great day yesterday and mused: “There might be individual reasons for those disappointments, some of which will become clear over time. It doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong at Closutton. But it’s something to fret about as Mullins approaches one of the busiest days of his year.”

One to watch as the day goes on ….

Trainer Willie Mullins watches Lossiemouth run below par at Kempton Park on Thursday. Photograph: Morgan Treacy/INPHO/Rex/Shutterstock
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Preamble

Greg Wood

Greg Wood

Good morning from Kempton Park ahead of another day of outstanding festive racing action both here and in south Wales, where 15 runners are due to go to post for the Coral Welsh Grand National, the most valuable event of the Welsh racing year.

It was a foggy start to the day in Wales, but conditions have steadily improved ahead of the first race at 12pm, and the action in the market for the big race has been livening up too. Monbeg Genius, formerly the property of controversial couple Doug Barrowman and Michelle Mone, was favourite yesterday morning but has been friendless in the betting and is out to 9-1, and there are now no fewer than four horses – Atlanta Brave, Jubilee Express, Iron Bridge and Evies Vladimir – vying for favouritism at odds of around 7-1.

Here at Kempton meanwhile, the big attraction is a head-to-head between two of the most exciting novice chase prospects around, Sir Gino and Ballyburn, in the Grade Two Wayward Lad Novice Chase at 1.55. Sir Gino, who is still just four years old, switches to fences after successfully deputising for his stable companion, Constitution Hill, in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle last month, and remains unbeaten after five starts over hurdles, while Willie Mullins’s Ballybur has just one defeat on his record and, unlike Sir Gino, a Cheltenham Festival win to his name in the two-and-a-half mile novice hurdle back in March.

There are some big names in action in Ireland too – Gaelic Warrior, last year’s Arkle Trophy winner, makes his seasonal debut there in a Grade One at 1.10 – and you can follow all the action, wherever it might be, here on the live blog as the day unfolds.

A huge crowd turned up for the racing at Kempton on Boxing Day. Photograph: Steven Paston for The Jockey Club/PA
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