Ruby's views on some of last week's Cheltenham highlights

Ruby Walsh has been reflecting on the feature races at last week's Cheltenham Festival. He outlined his views on Paddy Power Media's Podcast 'From The Horse's Mouth'.

On Rachael Blackmore and Honeysuckle: "In the Champion Hurdle it set up for her and she rode a horse as you should ride it - she didn’t get Honeysuckle on her head, she just sat where Honeysuckle was comfortable to travel and didn’t chase too early.

"But it was a brilliant performance and to me it was Henry’s best training performance of the week as well.

"He has allowed Honeysuckle to progress all through her career, resisted the temptation and urgings of others to maybe step her up in grade too soon, he’s allowed her to progress and mature through her career and her last two performances have been her absolute best.

"And she’s still improving, that’s what I took out of it. I thought that was a 10 out of 10 training performance. I wouldn’t [go 2 ½ miles in the Aintree Hurdle] . I’d be going to Punchestown with her if she was mine and I think a lot of the Irish horses will go from Cheltenham to Punchestown.

"I think Punchestown will be epic when you think of all the winners that could turn up in Punchestown and Aintree might be the one that struggles.

On Monkfish who overcame a scare at the last to win the Brown Advisory Novices' Chase: "Talking to Paul Townend after, he just felt that the horse wasn’t concentrating. It was a completely new environment for him, the tracker cam on the inside, wide open spaces compared to Leopardstown where there’s basically two tracks, at Cheltenham there’s four of them.

"He just felt he was watching everything and not watching what he should have been doing but good horses do still win even when they’re doing things wrong and that’s exactly what Monkfish did.

On Allaho in the Ryanair Chase: "You kind of thought when they came across the middle of the track to join the racecourse proper that Paul and Rachael were just, what are they at, they’re taking each other on, this is going to fall apart for somebody who’s behind them.

"But it didn’t and Min was the only horse that went with Allaho, he paid the price for it but the others never landed a glove on him. It was spectacular to watch.

"I’d say what we’ve definitely figured out is that he doesn’t want three miles or three miles and one — I’d say we’ve figured that part out, whether we ultimately got it right at 2m 5f or 2m 4f who knows but there’s no middle-distance race in Punchestown so he either comes down to possibly take on Put The Kettle On and Chacun Pour Soi or he goes up to take on Minella Indo and Al Boum Photo.

"He’s already tried that in Leopardstown and it didn’t work so I could see him coming down in trip."

On Flooring Porter making all in the Stayer's Hurdle: "I just couldn’t see a horse doing what he did. It’s a very hard thing to do to make all on the New Course like he did — I know we saw the mare of Paul Hennessy’s (Heaven Help Us) do it in the Coral Cup which can be a frantic race but it’s much easier to make the running on the Old Course than it is the New Course.

"Flooring Porter was just brilliant. It was a spectacular performance and he could just even be a little easier to ride at Punchestown.

On Gold Cup winner Minella Indo: "I had forgotten him. I really liked him in Wexford and Navan.

"Then when he fell I forgave him that but I didn’t forgive him his last run. I thought he was a bit high and a bit cautious although Henry has explained it very well since.

"So yeah I had forgotten him but I thought it was a brilliant race to watch.

"I thought it had what you wanted, it had pace. Black Op, Frodon, Kemboy, it was end to end and from the time they went out on the last circuit you were just looking at three horses — your eye was drawn to the almost the line formation they had — it was Minella Indo getting closer, Al Boum Photo tracking him, A Plus Tard following him and the cream was just coming to the top.

"Minella Indo jumped better than the second and third. A Plus Tard was only okay, Al Boum Photo missed a couple, maybe that was the pace of the race, but the winner jumped the best of the front three.

"To me it was telling that Paul Townend was out at the back of the third last fence, but when Rachael arrived down his outside, she was able to put him back in. I knew it was race over then for Al Boum Photo, the fact that Paul couldn’t hold his position.

"It was just one horse going better than the other and looking back on it, with the benefit of hindsight as we should do with all these things, Al Boum Photo has probably run better than he did in winning either of his Gold Cups."