Elliott has faith in Clarcam for Arkle

Trainer Gordon Elliott has talked up Clarcam’s chances of making an impact in the Racing Post Arkle at Cheltenham next month.

Clarcam alerted his rivals with a big Grade One victory when taking the Racing Post Novice Chase at Leopardstown on December 27, beating the highly-fancied Vautour in the process, and he now heads to The Fesival looking for more success.

A probable big obstacle for the Arkle at Cheltenham, however, is Un De Sceaux – who overcame Clarcam in the Irish Arkle last month – but Elliott is still optimistic ahead of the trip to Prestbury Park.

“He’s a gentleman, the way he travels and jumps and obviously he’s won a Grade One for us. He was travelling very well in the Fred Winter when he came down last year,” he told At The Races.

“He didn’t run a bad race the last day against Un De Sceaux, I just think he is a very special horse. We know he’s been to Cheltenham and he handles the track and we’re going to run in the Arkle.

“If your man (Un De Sceaux) stands up he looks unbeatable, but you can’t be afraid of one horse. If you were to listen to everyone you wouldn’t run anywhere, but he’s in good form and we’ll go straight to Cheltenham now and if he can get placed it would brilliant.”

He added: “If he runs the race he ran the last day or the time before, he’d have to have a massive each-way chance.

“We tried to follow Ruby (Walsh) the last day from the second last and got very tired after the last and shot ourselves in the foot.”