There’s been some talk this week of returning this race day to a mixed affair. As it is, the Flat takes centre stage on Friday with the Jumps Finale crowning this season’s National Hunt champions on Saturday.

Some top-class jumping does indeed feature and across the whole card. In the case of the bet365 Gold Cup, we have a very competitive race indeed which is the typical nature of a valuable handicap as opposed to the under-supported conditions races we’ve witnessed this term.

This year the race is worth a cool £160,000, with £90,000 of that going to the winner. The combination of good ground, a 3m5f trip and 24 fences means we’re looking for class, speed between the obstacles and stamina with these six being the ones we like against the field.

Main Contenders

Enrilo

Well backed all week, Paul Nicholls’ eight-year-old has plenty of ticks in important boxes.

The winner of this race last year before being disqualified and placed third, Enrilo has since taken in another three chases making a total of eight in his career and he may be able to make that extra experience count.

In fact, he’s only 1lb higher now than when “winning” the race twelve months ago and he’s in very similar form too. Big chance.

Fidux

Trainer Alan King has won the last two runnings of this race with Talkischeap and Potterman. He has another strong chance this time around too in the shape of Fidux.

In the last ten months he has displayed the pace to win over sub-three miles on good ground, but also finished fourth in the Scottish Grand National last time.

He has plenty in his favour on paper, though he is 52 runs into his career and most certainly isn’t getting any better.

Flegmatik

Dan Skelton’s runner comes into this contest on a hat-trick having landed races over three miles and 2½ miles at Kempton.

To go up in trip by a full mile may present problems, but he appears to have plenty of stamina as well as class and we must take into account the sharp upward curve he is on.

He went into his three-miler at Kempton rated 123, was rated 130 for his next win and comes into this rated 139. He had just 15 days between those two wins and he’s been doing it easily, meaning we have no idea where his ceiling is but we could go along way towards finding out in his race.

Kitty’s Light

The solid second favourite, it would be hard to leave out a horse trained by Christian Williams who has been runner-up in his last two starts.

Those races were over three miles in the Coral Trophy and over four miles in the Scottish Grand National. Stamina then is not the issue.

There could be more to come from Kitty’s Light, but he’s probably handicapped up to his best for now.

Musical Slave

Musical Slave has a similar profile to Flegmatik. Coming in on the back of two wins in a row, Philip Hobbs’ runner is another who hasn’t had to go this far yet but looks more than capable of doing so.

A very good winner of the Staying Chase Series Final, he is up 7lbs in the weights but again is on an upward trajectory and could be better than this.

In his case, the niggling doubt is that his last run was just a week ago and we have no idea whether or not he is in peak condition for this weekend.

Win My Wings

Christian Williams is becoming a master with these staying handicap chases.

Win My Wings has won four of her last 6 starts; a 3¼-mile chase at Cheltenham last year, a three-miler at Exeter, the Eider Chase at Newcastle and the Scottish Grand National too.

That is some record, she might not be done yet and overall, she’s still improving. She did go up 14lbs in the handicap for her last win though and could be vulnerable now.

Summary

As the first past the post last year, coming into this in similar form and being only 1lb higher in the weights, Enrilo is a very obvious contender and can’t be overlooked.

That’s not to say however that there isn’t something in the field simply better handicapped.

One candidate for that is Musical Slave if he has recovered sufficiently from last week’s exertions, but the one climbing the ladder faster than anything else in the race is FLEGMATIK and he is taken to land the pot.