Ante-post on antenatal

Coral bookmakers yesterday came up with as cheeky a bet as can be conceived when they quoted odds about a horse that is almost a year away from being born one day winning the Champion Hurdle.

The horse's dam is Flakey Dove, winner of the 1994 Champion Hurdle, who has just been tested in foal to Alderbrook, the horse who followed in her hoofprints by winning the race a year later. The odds are 150-1.

"You simply could not have a better-bred Champion Hurdle prospect than this," Coral's spokesman, Simon Clare, said. "Alderbrook and Flakey Dove were two of the most popular hurdlers of recent times."

Scarlett Knipe, who runs the Cobhall Court Stud in Herefordshire where Flakey Dove was covered last month, said: "Everything appears to be going well with her. We are looking forward to the result." She meant the birth, not the bet.