• Trainer reveals hurdling great lame and having tests
• Unbeaten horse off track with ailments for nearly a year

Constitution Hill, the unbeaten winner of the 2023 Champion Hurdle, is currently lame and “unlikely” to run in next weekend’s Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle, Nicky Henderson, the gelding’s trainer, said in a statement on X on Friday.

Constitution Hill has been off the track since extending his unbeaten record to eight wins in the Christmas Hurdle at Kempton on 26 December last year and the news that he has suffered a training setback follows a racecourse gallop at Newbury on Tuesday morning which Henderson said would ensure the seven-year-old was “ready for action” at Newcastle on 30 November.