Jonbon has for much of his career been on a hiding to nothing, but can transform his Cheltenham reputation with victory in the Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025 on Style Wednesday, 12 March, at the Festival.
He’s the full-brother of Douvan that cost JP McManus a small fortune as the leading Irish owner seeks success in the one major race at Prestbury Park that has eluded him. No, it’s not a misprint. The green and gold silks really haven’t been carried into the winners enclosure by a two-mile Champion Chaser. Not yet.
It’s a case of now or never for Jonbon. He has wins at Cheltenham races under his belt before, just not at the Festival. Twice has Nicky Henderson’s stable star, unbeaten at other courses like Aintree, Ascot, Newbury and Sandown, had to settle for being the bridesmaid.
Left for dead by Constitution Hill in the 2022 Supreme Novices’ Hurdle and then no match for old rival El Fabiolo in the Arkle the following year, it’s been tough luck for Jonbon. He didn’t even turn up at the Festival last year with a viral cloud hanging over Seven Barrows.
Don’t jinx it, but everything has gone right since though. Jonbon has made serene progress with five subsequent victories to his total absence from Cheltenham results in 2024. Four of those have come at Grade 1 level. Brother Douvan won eight times in elite company.
Jonbon has surpassed his sibling, but still lacks that Festival triumph to complete his CV. At the age of nine, he will probably never get a better chance than the Queen Mother Champion Chase in 2025 of ending that hoodoo. The reason is the lack of serious opposition. Henderson has won this race a joint-record six times, so the trainer certainly knows how…
Marine Nationale Win in Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025 Would Be Poignant
The market can’t tell you everything, but Jonbon is odds-on with Cheltenham betting sites to make it third time lucky at the Festival. That implies a deserved win looks on the cards for him.
Champion Chases don’t always neatly follow the script laid out by the traders’ prices, though. Just ask Altior, a true Seven Barrows great, who twice didn’t make it to Prestbury Park in search of an historic third win in the race.
Even El Fabiolo, that old rival to Jonbon earlier in their careers, saw his jumping fall to pieces just last year. He pulled-up after just five fences. There are no guarantees in racing but, looking back over the market, what dangers there are this time must improve.
Marine Nationale is the sentimental favourite among Cheltenham horses in the Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025. Ridden to victory by the late Michael O’Sullivan in the Supreme of 2023, further Festival success would be fitting for owner-trainer Barry Connell.
The tragic death of O’Sullivan on the cusp of his 25th birthday from a fatal fall at Thurles in February casts a pall over jumps racing. If Marine Nationale can replicate that run of two years ago over fences, then there won’t be a dry eye in Prestbury Park.
Putting such sentiment aside and dealing with the situation logically and rationally is always difficult. For all his talent, Marine Nationale simply doesn’t have the level of form over fences to match proven Grade 1 performer Jonbon.
Is it success you could begrudge? No. Even the most stone-hearted of gamblers should celebrate and cheer Marine Nationale home. On what we know, he has something to find.
Improving Solness Must Prove Himself Away from Leopardstown
A big improver since trailing in some 25 lengths behind Jonbon in the Tingle Creek at Sandown in December, Solness has franked the form in spades subsequently. Joseph O’Brien reduced his string of National Hunt types in 2024, but kept a real Leopardstown specialist in this one.
Solness is third-favourite with most firms in the Cheltenham odds for the Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025 as a result. Since struggling up the Esher hill after the stamina sapping rhythm required by the Railway Fences, he has two Grade 1 wins under his belt.
First over Christmas and then in the Dublin Chase, Solness bowled along in front and made all. One crucial difference between Leopardstown where accounting for Marine Nationale by a couple of lengths and Cheltenham, though, is the topography of the courses.
Prestbury Park is anything but flat. Solness hasn’t proven he can handle the famous hill. What he has, however, is youth on his side. Two years in hand over Jonbon and one on Marine Nationale. It’s easy to attach labels to horses like “flat track bully”, but nobody can deny the remarkable progress made in this case.
What Solness must do if he’s to win the Queen Mother Champion Chase in 2025 is translate the pick of his form away from the South Dublin track. He might be capable of that, and the improvement made in recent months could continue.
The advantage Jonbon has over this particular rival is top-level success on undulating tracks such as Sandown and Ascot. He has proven himself. Solness has to do it away from home and his happy hunting ground.
Age Not on Side of Energumene for Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025
With Noel George & Amanda Zetterholm set to run their French raider Il Est Francais in the Ryanair Chase, that only leaves Energumene at a price shorter than 16/1 for this. Willie Mullins’ veteran is the forgotten horse of the division in many respects too.
Now an 11-year-old, Energumene won this in 2022 and 2023 in style. Put in his place by Jonbon after a successful return in the Hilly Way at Cork, it must be taken on trust that the fire still burns. Only Skymas and Moscow Flyer have become Champion Chasers at the same age.
It’s not unheard for a more mature horse on the Cheltenham race card to win during the Festival. but there’s obviously something to find here. Energumene had no excuses for the Clarence House defeat by Jonbon in January.
Mullins relies solely on him for the Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025, but hasn’t always found this a lucky race. Only Energumene in his prime has won it for the yard with a number of seconds and thirds prior to his breakthrough victories.
Captain Guinness from the Henry De Bromhead stable is the reigning Champion Chaser, but everything fell right for him 12 months ago. No spring chicken aged 10, he has it all to do to recapture his best form and mount a successful defence of the crown.
Quilixios, a past winner of the Triumph Hurdle, lost all chance at the Festival last year whipping round at the start in the Arkle. He also represents the De Bromhead yard and chased home Jonbon in the Tingle Creek after readily besting Marine Nationale on reappearance.
Libberty Hunter Could Outrun Odds
Mention of Quilixos also brings up Gordon Elliott’s Found A Fifty, who won at Aintree last spring. Second in last season’s Arkle to Gaelic Warrior, who looks set for the Ryanair, he has since given weight and a beating to Galway Plate hero Pinkerton and Solness in Grade 2 races.
Found A Fifty pulled-up over Christmas, however, and must bounce back from such disappointment. With Game Spirit scorer Master Chewy another one nominated for the Ryanair instead of the Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025, Newbury second Libberty Hunter could get in amongst the market principals.
Rated almost a stone-and-a-half (20lb) behind Jonbon, Evan Williams’ charge could be worth rolling the dice with. The simple reason for that is he has a 12lb higher mark than when runner-up in the Grand Annual on the Cheltenham schedule from Style Wednesday last year.
The way he shaped in Grade 2 company last time out suggests Libberty Hunter is worth a crack at the highest level, especially with so many question marks over other contenders. He has a lot to find with Jonbon on official figures, but the race may be run to suit.
Libberty Hunter comes from off the pace in his races and has plenty of course form from handicaps doing his best work at the finish. A Grade 1 like the Queen Mother Champion Chase of 2025 demands more, but he looks a bit of each-way value in a race where everyone expects a Jonbon coronation.
