..
The Cheltenham Festival . Day 2
The best news of the day was that Annie Power and Ruby Walsh got up, unscathed. Once you knew that she did and he did, you could set about trying to assimilate the day. Some day.
You knew that the Willie Mullins team was strong, and that it was a little front-loaded, that a lot depended on the opening day. But to genuinely expect four winners would have been to look at the glass and conclude that it was overflowing. And it wasn’t just four winners, it was the 1-2-3 in the Champion Hurdle as well as the 1-2 in the Supreme to boot. It was a day of days for the champion trainer.
Three winners for Ruby Walsh including the Champion Hurdle, two for Paul Townend, one for Barry Geraghty, one for JP McManus and Gordon Elliott and Jamie Codd, five Irish-trained winners and the 1-2-3 in the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle for Irish trainers to go with the Mullins 1-2-3 in the Champion. St Patrick’s Day is next Tuesday, not this Tuesday, right?
The Mullins juggernaut may continue on Wednesday. Closutton representative Nichols Canyon has been favourite for the Neptune Hurdle for a while now, but it may be that his stable-companion Outlander could have his measure. The Gigginstown House runner was a really progressive bumper horse two seasons ago, he won his first three and was so highly regarded that he was sent off as favourite for the Champion Bumper at Punchestown in 2013.
We didn’t see the Stowaway gelding after than until he made his debut over hurdles at Fairyhouse last November, and he duly landed the odds in impressive fashion. He was beaten by Martello Tower in a Grade 3 race at Limerick’s Christmas Festival on his next run, but that was over three miles on heavy ground, and Martello Tower is a really talented young staying hurdler, high in the betting for Friday’s Albert Bartlett Hurdle. He lost no caste in getting out-stayed by Barry Connell’s horse.
Back over two and a half miles at Leopardstown in January, Outlander exacted his revenge on the Mags Mullins-trained gelding. Not only that, but he travelled well through his race and he showed a really impressive turn of foot on the run to the final flight to put the race to bed.
Two and a half miles appears to be his optimum trip for now, he goes well on goodish ground, and that turn of foot could be a potent weapon in the context of this race.
Continuing the theme, Champagne Fever could provide the champion trainer with his first ever Queen Mother Champion Chase.
Thought of as a potential Gold Cup horse at the start of the season, the grey – another Stowaway gelding – just didn’t get home in the King George on his first attempt at three miles in December. He raced a little too keenly through the early stages of the race and, while he travelled well into the home straight, he faded over the final two fences, as his early exertions took their toll, to finish fourth.
Dropped back down to two and a half miles, he fell at the last fence in the Kinloch Brae Chase at Thurles when he was being challenged by Don Cossack, but Don Cossack is a high-class horse, a worthy favourite for Thursday’s Ryanair Chase. Also, Champagne Fever looked very good on his most recent run, also over two and a half miles, in landing the Red Mills Chase at Gowran Park last month. That was a good confidence-booster, an ideal springboard to Cheltenham.
While Champagne Fever is ostensibly bred for stamina, it is over two miles that he has excelled at the Cheltenham Festival. He won the Champion Bumper three years ago, he won the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle two years ago and he was beaten a head in the Arkle last year. We know how important previous Cheltenham Festival form is in the context of this week, and Susannah Ricci’s horse is almost three for three in Grade One races at the Festival over the minimum trip.
A strongly-run race over two miles at a stiff track on good ground could represent optimum conditions for him. And at least we know that the yard is in form...
Donn McClean
