Turf Topics: McCoy books a spare Festival date on Zaynar

Having been booked to ride Denman, the 2008 Gold Cup hero, McCoy now has two more eye-catching bookings in the major races – Forpadydeplasterer in the Queen Mother Champion Chase and Zaynar in the Champion Hurdle.

The latter decision is particularly disappointing for Andrew Tinkler, the young and much-improved Malton-born jockey who won on Nicky Henderson's grey earlier this season.

Yet, despite Zaynar's owner, Victor Chandler, indicating his support for Tinkler, it was always likely that Henderson would opt for McCoy's greater experience once it became clear that the champion jockey's first employer, the owner JP McManus, had no runners in the Champion Hurdle.

Henderson was speaking at an open day yesterday where he confirmed that his No 1 jockey, Barry Geraghty, would almost certainly stay loyal to Punjabi – last year's Champion Hurdle victor and winner of a prep race at Kempton on Saturday.

The challenge for Tinkler and his great friend Sam Thomas, who has previosly ridden Denman with such distinction and was in the saddle for the 2008 Gold Cup, is to respond to such setbacks by demonstrating, with their riding, that they have the necessary experience, confidence and acumen when McCoy finally retires.

Tinkler's horsemanship over the past two years, where he has translated the early promise of his teenage years into a more rounded and less impetuous style of riding, shows that he is a force to be reckoned with and, at 24, he has time on his side.

"AP will ride whatever Barry doesn't in the Champion," said Henderson. "I think Barry will stick with Punjabi through loyalty.

"Zaynar does stay very well. He won the Triumph last year but the Champion is run on an easier course and I think that will be against him."

Punjabi had plenty in hand when obliging at long odds-on at Kempton, and Henderson continued: "I was genuinely thrilled with him. He had a good blow, it will have done the job and he is going there with everything looking rosy in the garden.

"Punjabi is a forgotten horse and unless he retains his crown he will go down as the most forgotten Champion Hurdle horse of all time."

Triumph Hurdle winner Zaynar suffered his first defeat over timber when beaten as the 1-14 favourite by the Howard Johnson-trained Quwetwo and Henderson believes the outing will have done him the world of good. "He had a mighty blow after Kelso and people keep on telling me how good the winner is," explained the trainer. "Kelso proved he needed it badly and if we hadn't run then I would have been stuck."

In other Cheltenham news, Henderson said that stablemates Punchestowns and Long Run are the best two chasers he has trained as they prepare to oppose each other in the RSA Chase.

The French recruit Long Run, owned by Robert Waley-Cohen and to be ridden by his son Sam, made an impressive debut in this country in the Feltham Novices' Chase at Kempton when he beat Keith Reveley's stable star Tazbar with ease in spite of the odd jumping error.

Punchestowns, second to Big Buck's in last year's Ladbrokes World Hurdle, will be ridden by Geraghty, leaving a potential opening on Henderson's third string Burton Port, the winner of Ascot's Reynoldstown Chase.

"His owner Trevor Hemmings wants to run," added Henderson.

"He has nowhere else to go and he deserves to be there – in another year he would be our main runner.

"We're not sure about jockeys, Andrew Tinkler gets on very well with him and AP McCoy can ride whoever."

It is a scenario that Tinkler is likely to become accustomed to before Cheltenham starts a fortnight today with the Champion Hurdle.

Today's National Hunt fixtures at Catterick and Leicester will both have to pass 8am inspections.

Comply or Die, the 2008 Grand National winner, heads the entries for Saturday's Grimthorpe Chase at Doncaster – one of the more incisive Aintree trials.