THE backdrop to the 2020 Cheltenham Festival might have been surreal but the racing itself made more sense than usual from Tuesday (dealt with in last week’s column) through to Friday.

One result that was not easy to foresee, however, was that of the Queen Mother Champion Chase.

What had been billed as the race of the season became the match of the day when Altior fell by the wayside, then an apparent cakewalk for Defi Du Seuil as Chacun Pour Soi was an even later scratch.

Someone forgot to read the script.

With Defi Du Seuil not really going from an early stage, Harry Skelton and Politologue took the race by the scruff of the neck and stormed to a near 10-length win from Dynamite Dollars and Bun Doran, both mid-to-high 150s performers.

It might have been unexpected, but it was probably pretty good, with Politologue getting a 169 figure from me after some upgrading for sectionals.

That upgrading comes about as a result of his having gone faster than ideal, rather than slower, in the early stages. He came home in 96.6% of his average race speed (where around 99% would be par) and those he beat finished even slower in those terms.

In other words, Politologue ran fast and kept going, at least to a degree. It was certainly not a case of him having an easy time of things up front. That 169 figure has him level with Altior and Defi Du Seuil but behind Chacun Pour Soi (revised to 174) and Min (170) in the wider scheme of things.

It should be remembered that when Politologue lost to Defi Du Seuil in the Shloer Chase at Cheltenham in November it was only by a narrow margin and when conceding 3lb. He may not have been the most consistent in recent times, but he is very able on his day, and this looked a high-class effort on time despite the limitations of his rivals.

One thing to note is that the Champion Chase was the slowest chase up the run-in on the Old Course on the first two days, at 21.6s, compared to, say, 19.9s for the Arkle Chase won by Put The Kettle On and 21.1s for the RSA Chase won by Champ.

That is further testament to the strong pace at which the Champion Chase had been run, but also to how testing ground conditions still were on Wednesday: heavy, though tending towards soft, by my reckoning.