Ruby’s Gold ambitions have him focused on being the leading man
ON the Wednesday night at Cheltenham last year, the mood in the house Ruby Walsh shares with family and friends was sombre as ‘Team Mullins’ were without a winner.
Mostly, the horses had run well only to find one or two too good for them, but Douvan’s demise in the Champion Chase cast a long shadow.
Suddenly, David Casey, a quiet man in the Mullins camp, shook everyone up.
‘David banged the table and said two things “we’re going to have a fourtimer tomorrow” and we did,’ recalled Ruby Walsh.
‘And then David said, “And Willie is going to be champion trainer at this meeting” and had Bapaume finished ahead of Mega Fortune in the Triumph Hurdle, instead of being behind him by a short-head, Willie would have done it.’
Even after 56 wins and 11 leading jockey titles, Walsh approaches the Cheltenham Festival this week from the same unpretentious perspective: to ride one winner and come home on the plane that he’s booked on.
Every year, bar 2014 when he shattered his arm in a fall from Abyssial in the Triumph Hurdle, he’s achieved both aims, and this week is no different. ‘For me, those two things make a successful Cheltenham,’ he said. ‘Obviously, there have been years when I have been much more successful, brilliant years in fact.
‘I knew no-one had ever done a four-timer at Cheltenham before the Thursday of last year and that was special. I’d been so close to doing it with Annie Power, and never thought I’d get the opportunity to do it again.
‘But I am old enough and wise enough to understand that that is not always going to be the way every year.’ At 38, Walsh also knows success at Cheltenham carries a far greater reach than any other meeting, apart from the Grand National at Aintree which he’s won twice.
Ride a four-timer at Thurles on a Thursday and it makes 200 words of copy; do it at Cheltenham, as he did last year on the third day, and there is a global ripple. It’s why he did everything by the book to make sure he recovered from a broken leg and was fit to ride at a meeting he has never missed because of injury – what are the odds on that over 20 years?
Walsh returned to the saddle on Thursday, rode at Leopardstown on Friday and was also on board at Gowran yesterday, for some finetuning after a four-month injury absence
‘On this weekend in a normal year, I wouldn’t be doing too much, but it’s not an ordinary year, so I’ve been doing a few rides over the last few days.
‘Riding horses is like riding a bike, it doesn’t take you long to get back into doing it. While you need to be fit, as a jockey you’re more of a tactician than anything else.’
Walsh will bring his keen strategy to the opening Supreme Novices’ Hurdle, where he partners the Mullins favourite, Getabird, a horse he’s never ridden in public. Not that it’s a problem.
‘Had I ever ridden Noland? Dun Doire? People make a lot of those things, but the horse I rode at Thurles on Thursday in my first ride back, Lareena, I’ve ridden her once.
‘People make a lot of that, I don’t think it’s an issue,’ he said.
He has won the opener a record five times, including four in a row from 2011, when he also returned in the nick of time from a broken leg. But, it’s not the be-all and end-all of Cheltenham.
‘You make too much of the opener at Cheltenham, it’s still a two-mile novice hurdle, it’s another race, another winner if you can get your horse home first.’
There are other bigger races he cherishes. If Faugheen wins the Champion Hurdle, it will be the mother of all comebacks and a record fifth win for Walsh, who shares the record of four with Tim Molony.
If he could bag one race, and make his flight home in one piece, it would be the Gold Cup for Mullins on Friday. ‘It’s getting harder every year, but yes I’d love to do that,’ he admitted.
Mullins, who has been second six times, has four runners and Walsh will chose from three – Total Recall, Killultagh Vic or Djakadam.
It’s not a straightforward call as none have the form or profile of the favourite Might Bite.
‘Total Recall is an improver but may have to improve by a stone on his win in the Ladbroke Trophy to get there.
‘Killultagh Vic lacks experience, he has only run in three steeplechases in his life, in one of them he fell, in a second he almost fell, while Djakadam has been there and done it, almost.
‘He’s trying to do what The Fellow did in coming back and win after three placed efforts, but The Fellow also won a King George [Chase].
‘They are all the pros and cons that I have to weigh up. Is Willie happy with the them all? Are the lads who ride them happy with them? You throw it all into the mix and make a decision.’
Mostly, Walsh makes the right one.