Patrick Mullins aims to tick Newbury off his list Patrick Mullins’ quest to ride a winner at every British jumps track moves on to Newbury tomorrow. The leading amateur rides Road To Home for his father Willie in the BetVictor Wishes You A Merry Christmas Handicap Chase on Wednesday. “It will be my first ever time at Newbury and I’m really looking forward to it,” said Mullins, who rode a winner at Catterick on Tuesday. He had already been successful at that venue previously. Irish Raiders and Tizzard Hopeful Another interesting Irish raider on the card is the William Harvey-trained Daydream Nation in the Amber River Life Landscaping EBF “National Hunt” Novices’ Hurdle. The Doyen gelding was an impressive winner of his maiden hurdle at Gowran in early October. Kripticjim is looking to back up his impressive win last time out, in the two-and-a-half mile contest. The Joe Tizzard-trained five-year-old created a good impression when beating Dan Skelton’s Loriko at Ascot. Ben Pauling’s Trial By Jury won an Irish point as recently as October and could give the likely favourite something to think about. Broom Hopes for Novice Progress Kripticjim runs in the Gold Cup-winning colours of Garth and Anne Broom’s Brocade Racing, and the former said: “We’re at the stage now we’re we are finding out how good these novices are really. “You have to learn to be a good loser in racing as you lose more often than you win. I’m hoping he’ll run well, there’s no reason he shouldn’t. He must have a good chance, he won nicely at Ascot. “When we went to Tom’s (Malone) he showed us two horses, Kripticjim and Alexei. He asked us which one we liked. Anne really liked Kripticjim as he’s her type of horse, but I liked Alexei as I thought it would be nice to have something different, so we bought them both and it looks a good bit of business.” Nicky Henderson’s Relkeel Hurdle winner Lucky Place gets the chance to atone for defeat on his chasing debut against just one other rival, Ben Pauling’s Jig’s Forge, in the Hoorrrraaaayyyy It’s Christmas Queens Arms “Chasing Excellence” Beginners’ Chase.
