Coneygree out of Gold Cup

Coneygree will miss the Timico Cheltenham Gold Cup as he continues to recover from a slight injury.

The 2015 winner was ruled out of the 32Red King George VI Chase at Kempton last month after failing to sparkle in a pre-race workout and was subsequently found to be jarred up.

Connections had hoped he would be fit to take his place in the March 17 field but he has not recovered sufficiently and they have opted to swerve the blue riband for the second successive year.

"I'm afraid it's (Gold Cup) not going to happen, which is a real shame," Sara Bradstock, wife and assistant to trainer Mark Bradstock, confirmed.

"When you have a horse like this you must not take any risks and there is no point going there half-baked.

"He has just niggled the bone, where the cannon bone meets the knee. He is still walking at the moment, but we must not take a risk as these niggling things can turn into fractures.

"We will not rush him and we will make sure he is fine before he comes back."

Coneygree, who was unable to defend his Gold Cup crown in March due to injury, could be aimed at either Aintree or Punchestown.

"He will do plenty of swimming and other stuff. Hopefully he will go to Punchestown and win the Irish equivalent," Bradstock added.

"We might just give him a change of scenery and run him in the French Champion Hurdle, which is over three miles and is usually run on soft ground.

"He might possibly make Aintree, but only time will tell.

Coneygree finished third behind Cue Card in the Betfair Chase at Haydock, his first run of the season, and connections are confident he will be as good as ever when he returns to action.

"I think we ran him on ground we had not trained him on at Haydock, as it had only rained those two days there and there had been no soft ground to train him on," she explained.

"He ran a great race at Haydock, but he might have been feeling this coming on.

"He has no miles on the clock and I'm hoping he can become a veteran record-breaker and a novice record-breaker.

"He is in very good nick, mentally, and is full of himself."