Route likely to miss Cheltenham

Direct Route appears almost certain to miss next month`s Cheltenham Festival.

County Durham trainer Howard Johnson admitted today that further rain over the weekend has all but ended any chance that his stable star will be ready to line up in the Queen Mother Champion Chase, a race in which he has been placed twice.

Johnson said that although a final decision had yet to be reached, he was favouring keeping the 11-year-old for Aintree`s Mumm Melling Chase in April.

Direct Route won the two-and-a-half-mile contest, run on the Friday of the Martell Grand National meeting, in 1999 and 2000 and finished third to Fadalko on unsuitably soft ground last year.

'You should have heard the rain we had last night, it was truly unbelievable,' a downbeat Johnson reported.

'I need to talk to his owners but it`s not looking good for Direct Route, it`s too soft everywhere to do a racecourse gallop and Cheltenham is only four weeks away now - we are running out of time.

'I would ratherleave him be and send him fresh to Aintree than try and get him ready on ground like this.

'The weather has been holding all of the horses up and it has been a very frustrating time for all of us.

'If we do miss Cheltenham with Direct Route then I just hope it dries out afterwards so it is good ground at Aintree, that`s his track.'