Exclusive: Freddie Gingell Believes December Gold Cup Likely for Il Ridoto after Paddy Power triumph at Cheltenham

Freddie Gingell indicates the December Gold Cup at Cheltenham is likely to be the next challenge for Il Ridoto after his emphatic success in the Paddy Power Gold Cup. 

The seven-year-old powered clear under 18-year-old Gingell to land the feature race at Cheltenham’s November meeting, for trainer Paul Nicholls.

A delighted Gingell said: “He was unreal! He jumped for fun, travelled like a machine, we winged three out down the hill, I landed there and thought I half got their too soon! 

“I turned in and kicked on and he’s been very good for me. He found it easy enough, you could tell because he had a right good look around when he got to the front.

“He was bottom weight this time and the handicapper has knocked him up a fair few pounds now. I’d say he will probably come back here for the December Gold Cup, where he was second last year and try give that another go.

“It doesn’t get any better, 30,000 people here at Cheltenham, it was the feature race of the weekend, the November meeting, which is a big meeting in itself, so to land the biggest race was special.”

Il Ridoto gave Paul Nicholls a fourth success in the race, but many of the eyes were drawn to his other runner, Ginny’s Destiny, who went off the 3/1 favourite.

It wasn’t to be for the market leader who pulled up late on, but Gingell was always confident he may be able to lead the Nicholls runners home. 

He said: “I came into the race thinking we may have a slight hand over him just because we’d had a prep run and it was always going to be his target. 

“He loves it round Cheltenham and he’s always run well here, so I knew he’d like the track and I knew he’d run well for me. I thought Ginny’s Destiny would take some beating, but it didn’t turn out that way and Il Ridoto won well.”

It was another landmark success for the young jockey who was promoted to Nicholls’ second jockey in the Summer, following Bryony Frost’s move to race in France. 

The champion conditional is still the aim for the season, but following the new David Power jump jockey’s competition, Gingell is targeting the lucrative prize for the conditional with the most points. 

He said: “Bryony went to France and Paul offered me the chance to be second jockey and I’m very thankful to him for thinking I’m experienced enough to take that job. I get loads of support from the team at Ditcheat and the Tizzard stable so things are going really well.

“At the start of the season it was in my mind to be champion conditional and it probably is more so now. In the last week there’s been the update with the David Power Cup, there’s a £25,000 prize for the champion conditional and everyone would love a bit of that, and after this win on Il Ridoto it would have got me a few points!

“The scheme is really good, it is going to help us conditionals get our name on the bigger stage and obviously the prize money is fantastic and I’m very thankful for the people who have created the initiative.  

Gingell continues to go from strength-to-strength and followed his success with a treble at Plumpton the following Monday, with all three winners coming for boss Paul Nicholls. 

At the time of writing, he is currently top of the conditional leader board with 20 wins.