Detroit City v Straw Bear, JumpingJockey.com Review English Hopes Taking on Brave Inca

BRITAIN'S two leading hopes for Champion Hurdle honours will race in a pre-Cheltenham showdown when Detroit City and Straw Bear run at Sandown on Saturday in the Agfa UK Hurdle.

[ClickPress, Thu Feb 01 2007] BRITAIN'S two leading hopes for Champion Hurdle honours will race in a pre-Cheltenham showdown when Detroit City and Straw Bear run at Sandown on Saturday in the Agfa UK Hurdle.

The three others involved in the battle for Cheltenham's Champion hurdler title include Brave Inca, Hardy Eustace and Harchibald.

Detroit City has already beaten two time champion hurdler Hardy Eustace in convincing style this season.

Hardy Eustace, in turn, beat the current favourite and 2006 Champion Brave Inca. Many consider this years race to be between both Brave Inca and Detroit City and given the current form Detroit City appears to have the edge when using Hardy Eustace as the benchmark for comparison.

There are still two other runners which are very dangerous indeed, Straw Bear and Harchibald.

The clash between Detroit City and Straw Bear will be run this weekend and should hopefully provide some pointers for this years festival as to whether this will be a two horse race or more. Hardy Eustace appears to be improving and given the way he beat Brave Inca, could well be making this a three way battle. A solid performance from Straw Bear will only add the the intrigue of this years Champion Hurdle race.

The only runner still missing is Harchibald, he's currently only 90% fit and thus will go straight to the festival. It will be difficult for Harchibald so he may well be the value bet for the race. If he runs anything like he can, he'll be there abouts at the end for sure.

Whatever happens, this years Champion Hurdle will be exciting, the JumpingJockey.com (http://www.jumpingjockey.com) team believe Detroit City will start favourite despite early bookmaker odds and tipped him up on their Ante Post selections at the start of the season in 2006 and currently see no reason to change their selection for the festival.

The only negative according to the JumpingJockey.com team for Detroit City is his age, he's simply too young for such a high class event at Cheltenham. No five year old has won the title, but, if he comes through against Straw Bear this weekend, there will be no doubt for all challengers that winning the Champion Hurdle in 2007, they will need to beat Detroit City.

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JumpingJockey.com (http://www.jumpingjockey.com) is a horse racing tipster service established in Jan 2006 specialising in the UK horse racing scene. JumpingJockey.com provide both premium pay tips for subscribers as well as free tips for major horse racing events. Tips include favourite lays, back, value and market watch.

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