Monday Musings: Talk is Cheap!

They say talk is cheap, writes Tony Stafford. Well, there was plenty of it going around at Cheltenham on Thursday with Willie Mullins and JP McManus both being highly critical of the state of the going. It was the basis of their late decision to withdraw last year’s winner and red-hot favourite Fact To File from the Ryanair Chase.

In his absence, the nine-length 2025 runner-up Heart Wood got the better of McManus and Nicky Henderson’s brave former two-mile paragon Jonbon by ten comfortable lengths. No wonder they were irritated by Fact To File’s absence, not that Henry de Bromhead would have minded.

In a week where Mullins did run 74 horses – his only other non-runner being Leader d’Allier through lameness in Tuesday’s opener - his carping about the ground, saying that he would consider not running horses at future Festivals if that were not addressed, seems a little illogical at best.

Across the four days, his uber-classy horses picked up around £1.6 million, comfortably ahead of last year’s haul. He’s now halfway towards Dan Skelton’s seasonal tally, but surely it’s still too much cash to make up. Skelton responded with two right old jobs in a couple of the hardest-to-win handicaps. Recent form wasn’t a clue to either, just Dan’s predilection for laying one out as he has been doing at the Festival for several years.

Over in the Willie corner, Mullins had eight wins, including both the Champion Hurdle and Gold Cup for the Riccis, six second places, three thirds, five fourths and a solitary fifth place. With seven pulled ups and a trio of fallers, the only spot he didn’t fill in the first 20 was 19^th. That’s something he might address next year – if he sends over any horses that is!

The times both on the Old Course, used on Tuesday and Wednesday, and the New Course for the final two days, seemed to suggest fairly similar underfoot conditions, usually close to standard. So probably good ground all round.

If the Mullins/McManus complaints had been in any way justified other than that the Thursday going would not suit one particular horse, albeit a very good one, then surely there would have been appreciably more than the nine horses withdrawn from the 489 slated to run. There were five absentees through lameness over the week so 475 took part, thus fewer than 3% in overall withdrawals.

Just as an example, Newcastle, one of the four Saturday jumps fixtures in the UK, had a total of 69 declared runners of which nine came out because of unsuitable ground on the day with the meeting raced on good to soft ground, soft in places going. Thus, seven times as many in proportion to the overall number of runners compared with Cheltenham.

It’s always a balancing act for Jon Pullin and his team. Often, as this year, until a fortnight before the fixture even heavy ground would be a possibility. Thanks to the effective drainage system on the track, a few dry, warmer days brings into play the need sometimes even for some selective watering, which I understand was applied to the hitherto unused New Course on Wednesday evening. Not enough for some (three on the day) but connections of another hundred plus were happy enough to run.

Although his banker of bankers didn’t run, JP had four nice wins and seven second and third places combined from the 32 of his horses that did compete. He had some disappointments among his most fancied runners, notably The New Lion, no match for Lossiemouth and just edged out by Brighterdaysahead for second in the Champion Hurdle. Another was his 7/2 favourite Proactif, one of nine for Mullins in the JCB Triumph Hurdle.

I would love to know which of the stable’s well-heeled owners gets first dibs when Mullins and Harold Kirk go on their shopping trips to France, mostly away from the sales ring. There are a number of juvenile hurdles, either in the late spring of the horses’ three-year-old season or later in the autumn, that get their attention, as was the case when Proactif made a winning six-length debut at Auteuil last September.

18 runners started that day and the easy winner Proactif had six lengths to spare over another debutant Apolon De Charnie. That horse was allowed to start 50/1 on Friday, half the price of the previous year’s winner Poniros, and he completely turned around the French form, winning comfortably with Proactif only ninth.

Ed Ware, founder and former owner the gaming site 32Red, has plenty of horses around the place, mainly with the Crisfords on the flat, and apart from Harold Kirk for recruiting jumpers, he uses the skills of former trainer and Godolphin stalwart David Loder in the sales ring for flat-race prospects.

What it cost to assemble such a squadron can only be a matter of speculation, but it is common knowledge that the HOS Syndicate paid €370k for Cork debut winner Minella Academy, who finished tenth of the 19 runners on Friday. It might not be fanciful to suggest that possibly the nine might have cost somewhere near (or even more than) the handsome seven-figure plunder the 74 Mullins horses earned over the four days.

It was probably a roll of the dice that led to Ed’s owning the right one of Mullins’ nine contenders on Friday. Mullins has now won the race five times in a row and seven in all, and the quirk is that all of the previous successful quartet ran last week.

JP’s Majborough, the 2024 winner, disappointed, probably having gone to too fast in the Queen Mother Champion for which he was the hot favourite. Last year’s hero Poniros, the one-time Ralph Beckett trainee, was a well-beaten sixth behind Lossiemouth, herself successful in the race three years ago, and now after two wins in the Mares’ race, graduated at age seven to the prime spot with a scintillating performance.

And you couldn’t keep the first of the Mullins quintet out of the picture, albeit away down in Sydney at the Rosehill track. Vauban, winning for the second time since departing for the stable of Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott, repeated last year’s success in a near £100k Group 3 race over ten furlongs. It was a fine performance considering he last raced in the Melbourne Cup over 2m when a creditable sixth last November.

Very smart over jumps, he also won a Group 2 race over two miles at York in the last season before his exportation. No doubt another go at the Melbourne Cup will be on the agenda as an eight-year-old.

The running tally of Irish against UK winners took a turn for the better for the hosts, only going down by 15 wins to 13, decided in the final Martin Pipe conditional jockeys’ handicap hurdle by Henry de Bromhead’s Air Of Entitlement. She beat 25/1 Hot Fuss (Tom Dascombe) following on from last year’s success in the Grade 2 mares’ novice hurdle when she was one of 20 Irish against the meagre tally of eight for the UK.

This time around that race – the Dawn Run – found a 40/1 winner but a very popular one in White Noise, trained by Kim Bailey and his long-time assistant, now joint licence holder Mat Nichols. It’s been 31 years since Bailey won both the Champion Hurdle (Alderbrook) and Gold Cup (Master Oats) in the same year. The skill’s still there!

Another big price came in Friday’s opener, the three-mile Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle, won at 20/1 by the still unbeaten over hurdles Johnny’s Jury for Jamie Snowden and Gavin Sheehan.

There were various names put forward for ride of the week, among them Paul Townend on Gaelic Warrior in the Gold Cup. That made it a record five times in the race for Townend, but I prefer the claims of Sheehan. In a week of ragged, irritating false and then second and third-time unsatisfactory starts, Johnny’s Jury was left at the back of the pack.

Few riders do better when intentionally coming from a long way back. This was never the plan, but Sheehan took his time for the first couple of miles and, steering wide, came past the lot to win tidily.

Snowden had one career as a soldier before going as a pupil assistant to Nicky Henderson, at the same time collecting a hatful of victories for several years as a rider in the Military races at Sandown. This was his third Festival win and he’s now very much in the top echelon of UK trainers.

The Henderson grounding is rarely lost and it was equally enjoyable to see the Lambourn master collecting three more nice prizes on the week in addition to Jango Baie’s terrific effort when second as the youngest horse in the Gold Cup line-up.

Both Gaelic Warrior and Jango Baie are previous winners of the Arkle Challenge Cup over two miles for novice chasers at the meeting showing, if ever it was needed, that speed is the best attribute for winning races, even over staying trips. What a week, pity Willie won’t be back next year!

- TS

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