Cheltenham 10/3/26 - Don't Go Back To Co-op

As is traditional now (if 3 years is traditional) I'm writing the preamble the night before so I have no idea how we've done until about 4 paragraphs time. Equipment dropped off today (Monday) at a largely empty racetrack and we pondered the imponderables of the week. Will we get enough of them beat, will we take 15 bets within 2 hours of pitching in and, when passing the infamous Bishop's Cleeve Co-op, will Kevin be able to find sausages in a fridge full of sausages? Kev was, again, trusted with the big shop and it turns out that this year Kevin, could, indeed, find sausages in a fridge full of sausages though, sadly, he couldn't find McVities Chocolate Digestives on a shelf full of McVities Chocolate Digestives and we're labouring through two packets of Belmont's Cheap and Not Very Cheerful - the clue was on the packet "Chocolate-ique Deeejestives". Kevin is, as we speak, telling anyone who'll listen that they "taste really nice" and "you can't tell the difference" - they don't and you can. To rub chocolatey salt into the wound, the fake choocy biscuit saving funded the ludicrous sum for an authentic Heinz Salad Cream "upgrade" he purchased. At lunch tomorrow I'll take enormous pleasure pointing out that you can't actually tell the difference in the salad cream stakes whilst simultaneously pelting him with excess Digestives that are steeped in disappointment. I've not checked the shortbread purchase yet but if someone has taken liberties with "Walkers" he's on the first flight back to Glenrothes in the morning.

As an aside, went to see an REM tribute band on Saturday, "Stipe" - phenomenal by the way- so the title of this blog could only have one source and the source of Sausagegate sealed the deal.

We're staying in Stratford, as it's impossible to afford accommodation within an hour of Cheltenham without the certain knowledge that we'll get at least 2 Poniros type skinners a day. As luck would have it, though, our digs overlook Stratford racecourse and there was a meeting on today so we spent a pleasant afternoon stood looking out of the lounge window watching them jog round whilst frantically waving at Pinno, in the direction of the betting ring, some furlong and a half away, but to no avail. Well, I say, "we". Me and Matthew (at his first Cheltenham) watched it out of the window whilst Kevin, a slave to the telly, was watching the exact same race on a tv stream, some 30 seconds behind. No, me neither. All change in the Guinness Village ring - the tunnel which used to emerge from the Village itself into the middle of the betting ring is, like the eponymous dead parrot, no more. Blocked off with a new stage on the village side and a new Tote booth on the course side of the great divide. Access is now only from the ends of the ring meaning there'll be an enormous game of bookmaker hokey cokey but, with pick 28 out of 30, the 3 Cheltenham truisms will remain - if there's a pixel in the photo it's the wrong way, it ALWAYS takes an hour to get out of the car park on a Tuesday, regardless of where you park and which exit you take, and we'll get the choice of pitches 6-8 on the back line. And there's an obscure Big Country album track in there if you look hard enough. In the absence of a CairnBet preview show, take it as my gift to you.

***** Tuesday morning update. Kevin, bless his little cotton socks, went out for petrol this morning and came back with these beauties. I pride myself that my "carrot and stick" approach to food discipline continues to pay dividends. Obviously there is very little, if any, carrot in this approach.

1) Inevitable bogey in Old Park Star - if it was in doubt, the weight of doubles and trebles made sure. Talk The Talk the other loser. Sober Glory, a good winner for us, looked the winner before a shuddering mistake and appeared to hamper our jackpot, MyDaddyPaddy leaving Old Park Star to pick up the pieces, mainly of our shattered 1st race dreams. Max loss to start. Another Cheltenham tradition.

2) Kopek Des Bordes the only game in town down at the Guinness Village and it looked like more bad news for us as it sauntered along side long time leader Kargese to a deafening roar (never good news for bookmakers) before, this time, we benefited from a last fence error and we had a bona fide jackpot on our hands. Multiples fell like confetti as we'd laid plenty involving both Kopek and Lulamba.

3) Good spread of betting and we were left with 4 losers in the book, sadly one of them was Saratoga who won easily and we took a step backwards.

4) Regular followers will recognise the patented CairnBet "done on a name" stakes. JohnnyWho became "Johnny, Oh Dear". our colleagues twirled. We lamented.

5) An element of fortune here as Lossiemouth was the bogey throughout the betting until a late chunk on The New Lion our loser and Lossie was a winner for coppers. Places were very good and we ended up winning modestly on a race we'd have lost on had it gone off a minute earlier. SOmetimes it's the ones you don't lose on.

6) I'm not entirely sure what to say here. Beaten in a couple of little jogs round the turn of the year, wins by half the length of the track after being absolutely smashed up. Congratulations Langer Dan. Sorry, Madara. Loser for us. Intensely frustrating.

7) Losers dotted all around the book and we finally had something to cheer with a fairly decent result on Holloway Queen was fleshed out with an unbelievably good place result.

I'm still at a loss how we can get out of Ascot in 10 minutes with its bigger crowd and single track roads and Cheltenham continues to be a traffic management disaster. 50 minutes tonight was actually on the quick side, which says it all.

Lovely to see our chap from Cornwall today who will be glad to know that sausage purchase without a hitch. I broke the digestive saga to him in my 6th race Spoiler Zone with him.

Finally, immensely proud of Matthew today. Incredibly difficult place to work and, in only his 3rd day on course, he performed tremendously. We go again tomorrow where it'll be betting summaries only unless Kevin has another bout of Shopageddon.

Until then...