Ascot Chase Tips: If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

Always a wonderful spectacle at Ascot, the Ascot Chase has seen some wonderful winners over the years. In truth, there is no star in Saturday's field but it looks a fascinatingly competitive contest, but Billy Grimshaw is incredibly sweet on a horse who has been there and done that in this race...

Earlier in the week a fresh layer of intrigue was dolloped atop this race with Emmet Mullins' Gold Cup entrant Corbetts Cross confirmed, surprisingly to many, to be running enroute to a crack at the Cheltenham Gold Cup. JP McManus's star is certainly a versatile sort, with a commanding win over a marathon trip in last season's NH Chase now looking even more impressive considering he could potentially end up as a horse best suited to this sort of sub 3m test.

The manner of his Cheltenham win marked him out as a future Gold Cup contender but he is winless since, including a pretty lacklustre run at Kempton last time out in the King George. With the fashion in which Il Est Francais blew that race apart it perhaps is not a formline to get too concerned about, and the stiffer nature of Ascot looks to be more his cup of tea. He could well be cherry ripe for this race, but my suspicion is that he and connections will have one eye on future prizes and as such he doesn't make appeal at prices around 9/4 now. Lord knows what those backing him at as short as evens in the week antepost were thinking!

The worry that this is not his cup final is exactly the reason I am also swerving L'Homme Presse, well beaten in the race last season and not given a hard time by Charlie Deutsch enroute to a crack at the Gold Cup. He is once again on that path this season and due to the weakness of the division on this side of the Irish Sea he is the main British contender for racing's blue ribband. I can't see him getting close to Galopin Des Champs truth be told and were I his owner he'd be primed for this rather than Cheltenham, but that is not the way they'll be playing it and with the horse he was so convincingly defeated by last season in opposition here once more, he is an easy swerve.

PIC D'ORHY is the favourite and the more I've looked at this race, the more I've convinced myself anything above even money rates value. He is the archetypal Nicholls horse of recent years, excelling in Grade 2s like this but not good enough for Grade 1s and with prize money always the name of the game at Ditcheat and this lad one of their most consistent inmates, he will have once again been trained solely with this race in mind all season long.

He likes the track, won't mind what the ground does and will be ridden positively - something I always prefer with my bets rather than backing a stalking horse - by Harry Cobden. Watch back his win in this last season and imagine you were a backer of Pic D'Orhy, despite L'Homme Presse travelling well for most of the contest there was never really a moments worry for the front running favourite and his jumping was truly a sight to behold.

This lad is a Grade 1 and a half horse (a term I'm sure I've not coined myself but it feels appropriate) and on a day when the Grade 1 animals have eyes on bigger prizes, he gleefully snaps up what's on offer. In 2023 he ran a cracker to only be defeated by Shishkin here, a horse who excelled around Ascot and who was comfortably better than anything lining up in here in 2025, and in 2024 he jumped like a stag. I expect a repeat performance on Saturday and if he does just that, he just wins. 7/4 is a brilliant price.