He recorded a winning margin of 10 lengths and a winning time of 5:07.34, the fastest since Frodon made all the running to win in 2019. JPR One was in a beautiful rhythm in front and helped to tow the field along, with Heart Wood settled nicely under Darragh O’Keeffe behind the pace. Once into the straight, Heart Wood was always travelling best and having got himself on terms he quickened clear with ease. It shouldn’t be forgotten that multiple Grade one winner Jonbon wasn’t able to reel him in. Jonbon was able to maintain his record of finishing in the first 2 and there is perhaps a suggestion that running in this race may have been an afterthought on the back of a couple of hard fought successes at Ascot. However, when the climb began up the Cheltenham hill, he once again came up short and a look at the data would confirm that there was only going to be one winner. Heart Wood came home with furlong splits of 13.03, 13.55, 15.23 and 16.31s, each of which were the fastest split of the 6 runners to complete the course and that gave him a late speed figure of 28.36 mph. His finishing speed of 102.8% was also the best in the race and meant that he recorded a winning time that was 3.5s quicker than Meetmebythesea in the Jack Richards Novices’ Chase over the same course and distance carrying 11 lbs more. They were different races and the handicap chase took longer to develop, with Meetmebythesea recording a finishing speed of 107%, but as time figures go, Heart Wood ran up to what would be expected for a race at the highest level. His top speed, run-out speed and late speed figures all ranked 1st and he managed to take 4.25s off his time in this race in 2025 when he was soundly beaten by Fact to File. This race might be remembered more for what happened 40 minutes earlier, but the facts are that 7 horses went to post and Heart Wood was easily the best of them on the day.

I don’t want to dwell on the ground. Trainers and Owners know their horses better than anyone else and if they feel the ground isn’t suitable, the horse’s needs and welfare must come first. Can we add anything on the ground debate? Well, the first thing to highlight is that Heart Wood’s winning time was almost 4s faster than the TPD Expected time for this race on “Good” ground. I can also add that the Dawn Run Mares Novices Hurdle was within 2s of the expected time, whilst both the Jack Richards Novices’ Chase and the Mares Hurdle winners were faster. The Stayers’ Hurdle was also 4s faster than the expected time and there’s no doubt that even with some light rain earlier in the day, the ground was certainly no worse than good. 

That’s really all that I can add and I don’t want the discussion about the ground to detract from the performance of Heart Wood, who ran better and faster than he did 12 months ago. We will never know if he would have beaten Fact to File but that shouldn’t matter. He is now a Grade 1 winner and he deserves to be treated as such.