Elliott has too much ground to make up
Plum prizes put Mullins well ahead of rival
TAKING Gordon Elliott’s jumps season at face value, there has been much to tip a forelock at before the final round up at Punchestown this week. For starters, there was Tiger Roll’s historic Aintree Grand National defence and Apple’s Jade’s Grade One double in the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle and Irish Champion Hurdle.
There were also his three Cheltenham Festival wins, including Tiger Roll, and 170 National Hunt winners on home turf where Elliott’s horses have amassed prize money in excess of €3.8 million.
Yet, for all his firepower – he’s saddled a staggering 1,180 runners in Ireland alone this season – Elliott is below his 193-mark of 2017, he’s 40 light of last year’s haul, when he grossed a high of €5.15m in prizemoney.
Those numbers will improve at Punchestown where Elliott’s charges will be aimed at as many of the 39 races as possible, seeking a hefty slice of the huge €3.2m treasure chest.
Only he is not alone. Willie Mullins is also taking dead aim at Punchestown and unlike 2017 and 2018, when Mullins reeled in Elliott to defend his Irish champion trainer’s title, this time he is out in front by a country mile, with 25 more winners and €1.1m more in prizemoney than Elliott.
Heading into Punchestown, 17 of the 21 most valuable National Hunt races in Ireland have been run this season, and Mullins has won six to Elliott’s three. Despite saddling 400 fewer runners than Elliott, Mullins has taken the plum prizes, including the Gold Cup at Cheltenham and Irish Grand National.
Mullins also finished as leading trainer at Cheltenham, where he bagged three Grade One races from his four wins, compared to Elliott’s sole Grade One from his three victories. And no one doubts Mullins will rule at Punchestown either, such is the strength of the classy team he has assembled.
In Tuesday’s Boylesports Champion Chase (5.30), Mullins has the first four in the betting, Min, Un De Sceaux, Footpad and Douvan, who was last seen chasing home Un De Sceaux in this two-miler 12 months ago. While Elliott may thrust the novice, Hardline into the fray, a 1-2-3 clean sweep for Mullins, as achieved in the National at Fairyhouse last Monday, is on the cards.
Another Mullins benefit beckons in the Coral Gold Cup on Wednesday (6.05) as he runs the respective winners of the Cheltenham Gold Cup, Irish Gold Cup and Savills Chase in Al Boum Photo, Bellshill and Kemboy.
It remains to be seen if Elliott aims star Apple’s Jade at the Ladbrokes Stayers Hurdle on Thursday (5.30) or Friday’s Betdaq Champion Hurdle (5.30).
The mare, formerly trained by Mullins before taken out of the yard by owners, Gigginstown House, scoped badly after the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham where her run was too bad to be true.
Either way Mullins is mob-handed in both hurdles, even in the absence of Faugheen whose Stayers win last year raised the roof.
For the three-miler, Mullins can call on the likes of Benie Des Dieux, Bacardys and Bapaume, while he has Melon, Sharjah and Wicklow Brave for the Champion Hurdle.
Like Apple’s Jade, the classy mare Laurina could run in either hurdle race for Mullins.
For the past two years at Punchestown, Elliott did his best to keep a charging Mullins at bay, only to be pegged back – the margin was less than €200,000 between them in 2017 when the title went to the wire on the Saturday. While Elliott will leave an imprint on the Kildare plains, it won’t be deep enough to halt the Mullins gallop in a week of racing that is likely to be a mirror image of the season.
Had either Samcro stayed fit or had Apple’s Jade run her race at Cheltenham, the script for Elliott may have taken a different turn, but we’ll never know.