Davy Russell loses race to be fit for Cheltenham Festival on medical advice

Davy Russell, the most successful active rider at the Cheltenham Festival, will miss next month's meeting on medical advice after revealing he will not have sufficiently recovered from the serious vertebrae injury he sustained last October.

The 41-year-old three-time Irish champion jockey, who won the 2014 Gold Cup on Lord Windermere, fractured his C6 and C7 vertebrae and dislocated his T1 when his mount Doctor Duffy crashed out of the Munster National with a circuit left to race at Limerick on October 11.

The leading rider at the 2018 festival, Russell had hoped to be fit to resume riding before the festival, which gets under way on March 16. However, while he is back riding out, his medical team have advised it would come too soon.

"I met with my surgeon earlier today and, although he is delighted with the progress I've made, he feels that I'm not quite where I should be in order to ride at Cheltenham next month," he announced via Bill Esdaile on Twitter.

"It is frustrating as I feel I've made giant strides in recent weeks on the road to recovery. However, after talking things through with Gordon [Elliott], we both feel it sensible for me to follow advice and miss Cheltenham as it is only weeks away.

"To ride horses of the calibre of Envoi Allen you have to be 100 per cent fit and I would be doing the team a disservice to ride when I'm not ready. Obviously, it's hugely disappointing, but it's important to make the call early.

"I will continue to work hard on my recovery and look forward to getting back in the saddle the following month. I remain so grateful for all the extraordinary medical attention I have received and thank you for all your lovely messages of support."

Easter's Boylesports Irish Grand National meeting at Fairyhouse, which is due to get under way on April 3, is the next high-profile jumps fixture after Cheltenham, but the Randox Grand National meeting at Aintree, with the big race there slated for April 10, carries extra significance for Russell.

Provided Tiger Roll gets the all-clear to run, Russell would doubtless be anxious to be in a position to resume his historic association with the 2018 and 2019 hero, the partnership having already become the first back-to-back National winners since Red Rum in 1974.

Davy Russell salutes the cameras aboard dual Grand National hero Tiger Roll at AintreeCredit: Grossick Racing

Russell's absence from Cheltenham means that Richard Johnson will now carry the mantle of the festival's most successful rider on duty this year. Russell's three wins at the 2020 meeting saw him leapfrog Johnson into second place on the list of active riders with 25 wins, and Barry Geraghty's subsequent retirement left him top of that pile.

Across the 15 festivals since recording his first festival win on Native Jack in the 2006 cross-country chase, the only time he did not score at least once was in 2019.

Last year, Envoi Allen's sublime Ballymore Novices' Hurdle success kicked off his week on the Wednesday, before Samcro brought the house down by edging out Melon and Faugheen in an epic clash in the Marsh Novices' Chase the following day. He then closed out the week by taking the Grand Annual on Chosen Mate.

All three horses were trained by Elliott, who has used Jack Kennedy in Russell's absence for Envoi Allen's three runs this season. Elliott has confirmed that partnership will remain intact in the Marsh Novices' Chase, for which the unbeaten seven-year-old is odds-on.

"It’s a shame Davy is not going to be back for Cheltenham but hopefully he'll be back sooner rather than later," Elliott said on Thursday.

"He has been riding out for the last two mornings and he went to the doctor’s today hoping to get good news, but obviously it is going to take a bit longer. His health has to come first so he just has to be patient."

Jockey Club Racecourses has revealed the Kim Muir will be sponsored for a first time this year after construction company JRL signed up to back the race. It will now be known as the Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir Challenge Cup (Sponsored by the JRL Group). The JRL Group is owned by John Reddington, himself an amateur rider.

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