Tag Archive for: Brian Ellison

Ellison hopeful of bold Plate defence from Onesmoothoperator, despite weighty burden

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Onesmoothoperator will have to defy a welter burden if he is to repeat his victory of last year in the JenningsBet Northumberland Plate at Newcastle.

However, his trainer Brian Ellison believes he has shown improved form in the intervening 12 months that proves he is now a better horse, despite being seven.

Since fulfilling Ellison’s childhood dream in winning the ‘Pitmen’s Derby’, the north-east native has seen his stable star win the Geelong Cup and be beaten just over five lengths in the Melbourne Cup, as well as run with credit in Dubai.

“He’s in good form and he’s obviously been trained for the race again,” said Ellison.

“He’s got more weight this year (12lb), but we’re very happy with him.

“The races in Dubai didn’t suit him as there’s no pace, but he ran great in Australia and I think he’s a better horse now.

“He wasn’t beaten too far by Kalpana at Kempton before Australia and he was close enough to Dubai Future in Dubai, who was third in the Gold Cup last week.

“He’s been away to Southwell a couple of weeks ago after we’d freshened him up and Connor Beasley will ride him again.”

Only George Scott’s Prydwen (9st 12lb) is above Onesmoothoperator (9st 10lb) in the weights after the confirmation stage, for which a record 62 were left in with a maximum field of 20 allowed.

Chester Cup winner East India Dock could turn out quickly having finished sixth in the Ascot Stakes last week, while Willie Mullins has left in both Pappano and Too Bossy For Us.

Andrew Balding’s Who’s Glen, the lightly-raced Golden Rules (Tom Faulkner) – who was second two years ago for Faulkner’s mother, Deborah, but had been off since then until running at Kempton in March – and Sir Mark Prescott’s progressive Godsend are others still in contention.

Monday Musings: A Little Bit of Politics

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I rarely delve into the murky world of politics and apologise for doing so now, writes Tony Stafford. But a conversation with a couple of senior and well-respected trainers over the weekend did at least offer an insight into how Rachel Reeves’ first Budget as Chancellor of the Exchequer will impinge upon the racing industry in general and trainers in particular.

The increase in employers’ contributions to National Insurance is a body blow, not least for employees. Trainer one said his increase in annual costs simply from that rise will be £40,000. The choice was to increase training fees, already dangerously expensive, or make one staff member redundant, saving £30K. A tough pick but one with an inevitable outcome.

Taken across all of racing, you might have thought this could have a beneficial effect as many trainers have been complaining since Brexit that the supply of qualified foreign staff has been significantly reduced. Yards in the big centres have been woefully short of fully qualified stable staff, but the new legion of redundant workers will hardly be the best in their respective places of work.

Staff reductions and smaller, if any, pay rises, will be the obvious result while in London tube drivers it seems will be able to work a four-day week on the same pay, courtesy of the Mayor of London.

The second trainer reckoned “a storm” is about to hit racing, after the Budget. Many country-based trainers also combine to a degree farming on their land. The change in inheritance tax rules will surely cause retaliation in some ways.

In France, by now tractors will have been lined up two by two on all the main thoroughfares, intent on bringing traffic if not to a halt, to a crawl. Coincidentally, last weekend, all racing in France was cancelled with many professionals joining a protest in Paris against the proposed increase in the tax on sports betting. €115 million was the intended haul from the new legislation. Jockeys, trainers, PMU workers and the rest were on show. Could it happen here? Doubtful.

Last weekend also featured the latest running of the November Handicap. At around the time I was getting most immersed in racing, I remember listening on the radio to a commentary on the 1962 November Handicap, in those days still run at Castle Irwell in Manchester.

It was a very big ante-post race and in the year of my favourite old-time flat horse Hethersett, the 1962 St Leger winner for Dick Hern, Towser Gosden (father of John) won the race with Damredub. It was a shock the other day when I noticed that this year’s race, although attracting a full field, carried a first prize of just over £36,000.

Inadequate records limited my research, but I was sure the race had been worth more in the past. A simple look back to 1993, one of my favourite renewals, as the Jason Weaver-ridden Quick Ransom’s victory at 6/1 was enough to win me the Sporting Life naps table that year, was enough to answer my question. Jason also won it the following year on Saxon Maid for Luca Cumani. Who’d have believed he won the race more than 30 years ago, watching him on TV working at the track on Saturday? Call him Peter Pan!

Quick Ransom picked up £24,000 for the Mark Johnston stable. The pound sterling in 1993 was worth £2.55 of today’s pounds, so the race’s real value had it kept pace with inflation should have been nearer 60 grand. Twelve years ago, when Brian Ellison won the race with Batswing it was £40k to the winner and the pound then represents £1.47 nowadays. Again, something close to £60k.

Brian Ellison has been around for a while too, so it was great that while his horse Onesmoothoperator could finish no better than 12th in last Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup, his owners still collected 85 grand. Had he been one place further back, it would have been nothing for unlucky 13th.

For Newcastle-born Ellison the Northumberland Plate win for Onesmoothoperator this June provided a kick-start to the six-year-old gelding’s explosion of earnings. Before collecting that £81,000, amusingly (or maybe not so?) less for a big-race UK win than his 12th the other day, he had run 33 times over four seasons.

David Simcock trained him at three, sent him to win his maiden first time out at Newcastle and gave him another two more placed runs there before switching less successfully to turf racing.

After six runs, he was sent to the sales and owners of Ellison’s bought him for 65,000gns. He won on December 22nd 2021 at Southwell but it wasn’t until almost two years (November 11th last year) and 18 runs later that he won another race - back at Newcastle.

It took another seven losing runs before his Plate victory, so in all just one win in 26 outings before the race that gave Ellison’s lengthy career what we thought was the fitting embellishment.

Sometimes, owners and their trainers can be over-cautious – Ellison has never been that, but to contemplate a winter trip to Australia where he easily won the £160k to the winner Geelong Cup proved his attacking policy so imaginative and rewarding. Just as St Leger winner Jan Breughel was ruled out by the exacting Racing Victoria veterinary team, so Onesmoothoperator also got an initial no, but survived a second vetting.

From Northumberland Plate to Melbourne Cup, five races earned the six-year-old gelding £326,000. His previous 33 races earned a total of £156k for three wins and 16 places.

It’s salutary to think what a significant part in his story the 57-rated Jimmy Moffatt-trained horse Yukon played. During his long losing run, Ellison sent him to Sedgefield for a maiden hurdle for which Onesmoothoperator started 2-1 on under Brian Hughes. Yukon, ridden by Charlotte Jones, was a 50/1 shot. Onesmoothoperator looked exactly that as he jumped the last hurdle level with Yukon, yet for all Hughes’ efforts, was beaten more than two lengths, seeming less than keen. He is rated 45lb Yukon’s superior.

Maybe if he had won that day, he would have been kept to hurdling and would never have seen the racecourses of Victoria.

What his history does tell us though is that many of the horses sold at the end of their three- or even two-year-old careers last month at Newmarket may have been disposed of prematurely. I know trainers who have been urged to sell horses by owners when often they believe their potential has not been anywhere near achieved.

So these horses – increasingly sold for export and the riches awaiting them elsewhere – are mostly never heard of again unless they crop up in one of those massively-endowed features over the winter.

There is still a market for jumps horses (where potential owners can get in a bid) and I’m sure that after the record amounts of rainfall in October, the big teams were getting ready for nice ground through the next couple of months.

But then two weeks ago, the taps went dry, and we had the prospect of a Premier Raceday card at Exeter on Friday when only 41 horses turned out – 12 absentees mostly citing unsuitable ground for their absence, and one race becoming a walkover. The Haldon Gold Cup with its £59k first prize, £23k more than the November Handicap, mustered five runners.

Two of Wincanton’s races on Saturday also outstripped the November Handicap prize. The Badger Beer did have ten runners and was worth £47k. The four-runner Elite Hurdle provided one of five wins for Paul Nicholls on the day and carried a £41k winner’s prize. Favourite Rubaud’s superior jumping saw off Brentford Hope, who should be winning again soon.

There was also more money on offer for the Grand Sefton Handicap Chase at Aintree, won by David Pipe’s lightly weighted King Turgeon. Fifth, staying on well up the run-in was Sure Touch, and he should be resuming normal service back on conventional tracks for the geegeez syndicate boys in red, dark blue and white.

- TS

 

Monday Musings: Crossing Borders

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You might not have noticed, but the British flat turf season ended with a whimper, as they say, on Saturday – on the Tapeta surface at Newcastle rather than on the swamp that was Doncaster, writes Tony Stafford. The end-of-season highlight, the November Handicap, sponsored by whoever they can drum up these days, was a denuded affair of half a field compared with its heyday, not that Brian Ellison or the owners of Onesmoothoperator minded as they picked up 36k of Virgin Bet money.

The last actual turf meeting to be completed had been Newmarket a week earlier and it wouldn’t have needed much creativity to suggest to trainers and owners that a decent turf surface there would still have been more likely than anywhere else in the country and could accommodate 20 runners with ease. The horses that turned up had presumably been geared up for a big race opportunity on autumn (or worse) grass and that’s what they could have got at HQ.

Instead, in addition to Newcastle, we had Aintree in the north-west and Kelso in Scotland over jumps, with Wincanton in the West Country and an all-weather card at Chelmsford in deepest Essex. There was again a mystifyingly small field for the first go over the Grand National fences this season in the not-so-Grand Sefton which attracted just eleven.

Meanwhile down at Wincanton, Paul Nicholls had a field day, sending out the first four winners before Anthony Honeyball spiked his guns winning the main race, the Badger Beer, with Blackjack Magic and then going on to complete a double, both with Rex Dingle in the saddle, this time on Good Look Charm.

Nicholls was still happy enough having swept up the other two main prizes, the Elite Hurdle, for the umpteenth time, with Rubaud, and the Rising Stars Chase with Knappers Hill.

I’d been wondering about the definitions of the United Kingdom, Great Britain and the British Isles before offering today’s quiz question. Bearing in mind Nicholls and his Wincanton four-timer, I ask, which trainer sent out most winners in the UK on the Friday and Saturday of last week?

The answer: Gordon Elliott, who provided 11 of the 14 winners at the two-day Down Royal meeting. Benefiting from a minimal representation from Willie Mullins, he had the first four on Friday and the last two after missing the fifth. Then on Saturday, he could not improve on his first five, despite having an odds-on chance in the last of seven races that day.

His tally there equalled his entire score of 11 more on Irish (non-UK) tracks over the previous 14-day period. Down Royal is close to the town of Lisburn, in the Six Counties, and situated around 40 miles from the border with the Republic whether you are travelling south or south-west as the border meanders its way across to the sea.

Of course, all the Down Royal stats apply to Irish racing. Its meetings, and those of Downpatrick, the other (and jumps only) Irish racecourse are staged under the Rules of Irish racing and all their statistics are included in the Irish returns. Many of the top domestic English, Scottish and Welsh jumps stables get a decent portion of their better imports though from the flourishing Northern Irish point-to-point field.

If the successes of Elliott and Nicholls tell you anything, the top stables have been stocking up avidly over the past 12-18 months and are going to be more formidable than ever. £300,000 plus is not unknown for a smart point-to-point prospect and, even then, success is not assured.

To illustrate that observation, three former Irish point winners lined up for yesterday’s finale at Ffos Las. Two that cost 100 grand and 85k respectively finished miles behind the Isabel Williams-ridden (and sourced at the sales) Followango. She paid 8k for the Evan Williams-trained five-year-old and owners W J Evans Racing could increase that probably by at least ten-fold if they wanted to leave the risk to someone else!

Gordon Elliott’s rehabilitation seems to have been largely achieved following the embarrassment of that infamous picture on his gallops. Talent will out as they say, though whether the major owners who decided to leave will ever return is another matter. But training is never plain sailing as he will be quick to admit. Yesterday’s nine runners at Naas, so back home in Ireland, produced no wins and just a couple of consolation second places.

The flat season may be over, the awards having been handed out a while ago at Ascot, but several trainers and jockeys have still been aiming at some of the major prizes available elsewhere. I’m not sure how Hollie Doyle is after unseating from her mount at Fukushima racecourse in Japan yesterday, while Ryan Moore would have been happier if the mare Geraldine, second choice for the Queen Elizabeth II Cup at Kyoto, had done better than finish in 5th place.

He has the consolation of the rider’s share of 85k, one tenth of the winner’s prize won by Christophe Lemaire on the favourite Brede Weg in this race for 3yo and up fillies and mares.

And the Melbourne Cup last Tuesday week had been a frustration for Simon and Ed Crisford as their former inmate Without A Fight collected the multi-million first prize having previously narrowly denied their present high-class performer West Wind Blows in the Caulfield Cup.

West Wind Blows, again ridden by Jamie Spencer, turned out on Saturday in the TAB Champion Stakes at Flemington but despite starting favourite for the £1 million plus first prize, could fare no better than 9th of 11. Prizemoney went almost all the way down but stopped at £33k for eighth!

There was a trio of UK jockeys riding in yesterday’s Group 2 at San Siro in Milan. The Crisfords targeted the race with hat-trick scorer Poker Face, ridden by James Doyle, while Archie Watson had two representatives with Oisin Murphy and Luke Morris doing the steering on Roman Mist and Brave Emperor respectively.

Once again, the Crisfords were disappointed, Poker Face started odds-on but the honours and the £100k pot went to Watson and Morris, with Brave Emperor striding to a four-length success over the favourite. The second Watson runner Roman Mist was denied third by a short head.

The Paddy Power Gold Cup and Greatwood Hurdle are the big races to anticipate next weekend as the jumps season now gets into full flow. The Paddy Power looks too complicated at this stage, and I’d like to see the first lot of acceptances later today before starting to formulate an opinion.

But I’m more than happy to put forward a tip for next Sunday’s Greatwood Hurdle. I always have a great respect for anything that Dan Skelton shows up with and can understand why his Knickerbockerglory is prominent in the market.

However, I was so impressed with the way Punctuation won going back on the flat at Doncaster, after a long layoff for Fergal O’Brien. That powerful win suggested he’d improved since his highly successful jumping stint last winter. Punctuation for me.

- TS