The Last Word: In the Cotswolds, Everyone's a Tipster

Adam Edwards navigates the whisperings of winners.

Technically 'Cheltenham' is the name of a Cotswold spa town. Actually, it is, at least to the majority of souls in the UK, a euphemism for horses. Or to put it another way the colloquialism, 'Cheltenham', when spoken of during the winter months is shorthand for the Cheltenham National Hunt Festival, the finest jump racing meeting in the world.

That spring race meeting, and the earlier meetings in the autumn and winter, is the hidden thread that runs through the Cotswolds. For these hills are both the spiritual and actual home of steeple-chasing and every local has some skin in the game, be it from highest horse-owner to the humble cabbie.

In November this becomes clear when the spa town hosts its first major race meeting. The highlight of that meet is the Countryside Day, a high society beano patronised by Cotswold natives and the racing faithful where huntsmen from the local hunts blow their horns and whip their hounds in front of the stands. This aggressively rural experience is enhanced by a swanky tented shopping village selling subdued tweeds, equestrian paintings and pheasant embossed knick-knacks to early-Christmas shoppers.

On New Year's Day a similar event, minus the huntsmen, is held. The hung-over congregation swap inside knowledge on the likely runners and riders and their prospects for the upcoming National Hunt Festival.

Then, in the third week of March, the Superbowl of steeplechasing is upon us. Cheltenham morphs into a bustling taproom of Guinness and suit-clad racegoers. In the surrounding hills, spare rooms become Airbnbs, SUVs mutate into Ubers and anyone with a gas ring offers a full English breakfast. Furthermore, every local has information about a certain winner.

My tale, for example, began over a pint a few days before the Gold Cup, the feature race of the meeting. My friend, a gentleman farmer and a mine of information when it comes to 'the jumps', had joined me for a drink after a funeral. At the wake he had met Nicky Henderson, the four-time National Hunt champion trainer, where the conversation had turned to Cheltenham and in particular to the upcoming Gold Cup. Mr Henderson indicated that a horse he had in training, Might Bite, might 'be there or there abouts'. That, in racing parlance, is a tip so hot that it smoulders. Meanwhile my farmer friend added that Might Bite was 'one to watch' – an equally powerful endorsement.

I looked up Might Bite's form. The thoroughbred had won the top novice long-distance chase at the Cheltenham Festival and the subsequent King George VI race at Kempton on Boxing Day. He was a hot favourite for the Gold Cup until a couple of months before the big race when he 'ran like a goat'. The solution was a wind operation. Yet despite going under the knife his Gold Cup odds were not good. However, Mr Henderson with his understated observation followed by the farmer's considered remark that the horse was 'one to watch' suggested to me that Might Bite would leave a winged Pegasus in his wake. I was sure of beating the bookies. I put 'a pony' (25 quid) on the selection to win.

It was the day before the race when a literary friend Sebastian, who works in the books department of the Daily Mail, but is an ignoramus when it comes to racing, surprised me by asking me for a tip for the Gold Cup. I had no idea he had heard of the Gold Cup, but I had no hesitation in telling him that Mr Henderson had, in effect, told me personally that his horse couldn't lose. The tip was, I said, 'straight from the horse's mouth'. Sebastian immediately told everyone on the paper including his mate, a sports reporter, that he had 'a dead cert' for the Gold Cup. On the morning of the race The Mail's sports desk told Britain that it had inside information that the 'talking horse' of the race and therefore the likely winner was Might Bite. The beast's odds plunged.

The official version of Might Bite's race was that the horse was 'not fluent, headed 11th, hit next and headed, bumped on last bend, weakened quickly and pulled up before 2 out' or to put it in layman's terms he would not have been placed in a two-horse Roll-a-Ball Donkey Derby. The experience cost me a pony and the object of Sebastian's fury as everybody on the paper who had backed the horse was no longer talking to him.

And yet earlier this year, my daughter was given a tip by her Cirencester hairdresser. 'Nicky Henderson's horse "Doddiethegreat" is a sure thing,' said the coiffure. 'His head lad's girlfriend's brother said it couldn't lose.' And so, my daughter put a tenner on it to win and sure enough, 'Doddiethegreat' stormed home. That's the thing about wintering in the Cotswolds; everyone knows a winner.