Cleeve Hill

BALDING WILL LISTEN TO C4 Channel 4 might have some luck if, as has been widely suggested this week, the broadcaster would like to sign up Clare Balding (right) to present its revamped coverage of horse racing from 2013. Confirmation is expected imminently that the station has secured the terrestrial TV rights for all of racing, including the Grand National and Royal Ascot, and it is thought that Balding, a veteran of the BBC's coverage, would bring authority and continuity to the role. Balding was at the Cheltenham Festival, broadcasting for BBC Radio Five Live. Asked if she would be interested in an approach from Channel 4, she said: "I've had no offers but, if I'm lucky enough to get any, I will listen to them." She added that there is, so far, only one job in her diary for 2013. Balding is a freelance and has an agreement with the BBC that runs to the end of this year. SUN'S MAN ARRESTED The Festival is a taxing time for all journalists, though it could be said that some make life harder for themselves than is really necessary. The Sun's longstanding racing reporter would appear to be a case in point this week. A report posted on the website of Gloucestershire police said that five people had been arrested in the area on suspicion of drink-driving, naming one as "66-year-old Claude Patrick Duval of Cranbrook". It seems the self-styled Punter's Pal was arrested in Cirencester on Tuesday evening and has been bailed to appear at Cheltenham magistrates next month. Contacted on Saturday, Duval had no comment to make. BRIDGWATER TURNS AIR BLUE Channel 4 were no doubt relieved that 50-1 outsider The Giant Bolster was forced to settle for second place behind Synchronised in the Gold Cup. In the aftermath of the race, trainer David Bridgwater twice described his horse's performance as "fucking marvellous", once during a Racing UK interview, before saying he had "put his cock on the block" with The Giant Bolster. "I get pumped up but if you slag my horse off you might as well slag my children off." CHURCH'S CAR CASH St Nicholas's church, near to the racecourse, offered the cheapest on-the-day parking at a fiver per car, but provoked a few outbursts from regulars when doubling the price for Gold Cup day. Decent moral values could be found at Cheltenham though – a bookmaker who accidentally set off for his hotel after the first day's action without his satchel returned to find it propped against the rail, complete with its £20,000 contents. McCOY WAS WHIP HAPPY Tony McCoy was celebrating Gold Cup glory aboard Synchronised, but if the champion jockey was to be believed, the increased restrictions introduced last year upon the number of times a rider could use his whip in a race was going to prevent the horse from ever winning a race again. Writing in the Telegraph in October about a previous victory, McCoy said: "He [Synchronised] is one of the most genuine horses I've ever ridden but he needed galvanising. I wasn't given a ban because he kept responding but under the new rules I'd have no chance and he'll struggle now." McCoy was indeed shaking the reins from an early stage of the race but needed to use his whip only eight times in Friday's race. TOILET TIPS PAY OFF Improvised card games weren't the only money-making activity to take place in the toilets this week. Instead it was the 'toilet tips' posted on the walls of the facilities around the track by race sponsors olbg.com which got punters talking – the first eight of the week all obliged at accumulative odds of 48,030-1. The tips were selected by users of the OLBG forum.