Will Constitution Hill rediscover electrifying best after startling dip in form?

The venerable Timeform organisation used a well-chosen four-letter word to describe Constitution Hill’s performance in the Boodles Champion Hurdle at Punchestown in early May, when the top-rated hurdler of recent decades started as the odds-on favourite but finished fifth of the six runners. It was, the firm’s post-race analysis said, a “disconcertingly tame display”.

Tame. Ouch. It is not a word that could ever have been applied to the first dozen races of Constitution Hill’s career, which ranged from the electrifying, effortless brilliance of his first two seasons to the high drama of falls at Cheltenham and Aintree this year.

At Punchestown he travelled well enough to three out, but when Nico de Boinville shook the reins Constitution Hill had nothing more to give. He eventually trailed home 27 lengths behind the winner, beaten when completing for the first time in his career.

The greatest racehorses, by definition, have further to fall when they pass their peak, but few have ever slipped as far or as fast as Constitution Hill in the seven and a half weeks between the Cheltenham festival and Punchestown. He lined up for the Champion Hurdle on 11 March as the unbeaten winner of 10 races, including eight at Grade One level. By 2 May , as he trailed home all of 27 lengths behind State Man in Ireland, he was a listless shadow of his former self.

It remains a troubling image before Constitution Hill’s return to action in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle on Saturday, but an essential part of the narrative too before what promises to be the best hurdle race this side of Cheltenham 2026.

The deposed champion on the comeback trail is up against not one, but two young pretenders in Dan Skelton’s The New Lion, an impressive winner at Cheltenham in March, and the unbeaten Anzadam, from Willie Mullins’s powerhouse stable in Ireland. The winner, almost certainly, will set off as favourite for the Champion Hurdle itself in the spring.

And if that winner turns out to be Constitution Hill, the stage will be set for one of the great festival showpieces next year, as Nicky Henderson, a trainer with plenty of previous when it comes to coaxing champions back to the summit, attempts to do for Constitution Hill what he did for Sprinter Sacre a decade ago.

That horse, like Constitution Hill, had compiled an unbeaten 10-race before he was pulled up with an irregular heartbeat in the Desert Orchid Chase at Kempton in December 2013. He was off the track for more than a year, and then beaten in all three starts in the 2014-15 season, but went unbeaten in four in 2015-16 including a memorable second success in the Champion Chase in March.

A similar story arc for Constitution Hill would arguably be an even greater achievement for a trainer who has shown plenty of resilience himself over the course of nearly 50 years in the game. Henderson won his second National Hunt trainers’ title in 1987, the same year he nursed the talented but fragile See You Then to his third Champion Hurdle victory. His third championship, after a quarter of a century of dominance by Martin Pipe and then Paul Nicholls, did not arrive for another 26 years.

So the script for a glorious final season to Constitution Hill’s career writes itself. It is just waiting for its star to take centre stage at Newcastle on Saturday, and prove that he still has what it takes.

Blizzard Of Oz set to strike Gold

Willie Mullins’s record in handicap chases in Britain is not all that it might be given his general dominance in jumping in recent years, but he has plenty of ground to make up on Dan Skelton in the race to retain the trainers’ championship and Blizzard Of Oz (2.55) is an interesting each-way chance for a typically competitive renewal of the Coral Gold Cup at Newbury on Saturday.

As a seven-year-old with just five previous chase starts to his name, Blizzard Of Oz is among the most lightly raced runners in the field, but he went close to winning a big-field event at the Punchestown festival on his only previous start in a handicap and finally got off the mark over fences in a three-mile Listed event at Wexford last month.

The time of Blizzard Of Oz’s Punchestown run puts him right in the mix for Saturday’s race and he appeals as the pick of the prices at around 16-1.

Newbury 1.40 The lightly raced Dominic’s Fault had just started to make significant progress towards the lead when he was brought down by a faller in front of him at the third-last at Sandown in January. He is 1lb lower in the weights for his first race since and has gone well fresh in the past.

Newcastle 2.00 In his prime, Constitution Hill would have set off at short odds here, even with two up-and-coming, unbeaten rivals lined up against him, but the memory of his listless run at Punchestown in May is difficult to shake off and Willie Mullins’s Anzadam, at around 9-4, looks the value bet in a high-class field. He has something to find with The New Lion on his bare form to date but is just two runs into his career with Mullins, and had plenty in hand when successful in a Grade Three at Naas in January, a race that was run in a strong time for the conditions.

Newbury 2.15 Emma Lavelle’s Indemnity ran a fine race to finish second behind the fast-improving Alexei at Ascot earlier this month, having looked the likeliest winner two out, and is just 1lb higher in the weights here.

Newcastle 3.15 Anthony Honeyball’s stable has started the season in excellent form and Jasmin De Grugy, who progressed by the run last season, can add another useful prize to his haul.

Newbury 3.35 The strong-travelling Rath Gaul Hill could find the race run to suit and though he has not been out since Aintree in April, he was a winner over track and trip after an extended break last season.