Fantastic festival is a cut above the rest
SOMETIMES YOU just know it’s your lucky day.
Sunday was a prime example. I had just finished the long overdue first grass cut of the year when the heavens opened.
Bucket loads of rain and hail poured from the depressingly darkened sky, a weather episode that had it happened moments earlier would have prevented me from finishing the task at hand.
Thankfully I can now sit back and look at the grass with that sense of pride that only those who mow lawns would understand, a feeling that would almost have you reaching for an ice cold beer to toast the success.
Not only that, but I also have the racing bonanza that is the Cheltenham Festival to look forward to – four days of top quality National Hunt fare that will really set the pulses racing.
The meeting is the Sport of Kings at its finest. The tingle of anticipation that rises as the horses make their way to the start for the opening race, the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle, is unique, and more often than not the festival lives up to its top billing.
For many it’s all about the battle to beat the bookies, but for me it’s so much more than that as wonderful stories are written and memories are carved in Cheltenham stone.
Whether it’s a small, unheralded trainer taking on the big boys and coming out on top, or headline acts that etch their names in racing folklore, it always manages to churn out terrific equine tales.
Just the sheer colour and excitement of the spectacle alone is enough to make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck, and the buzz of watching the horses line up at the start and then battling it out up the famous Cheltenham hill is sheer sporting poetry.
This will be the first Cheltenham Festival that won’t feature Ruby Walsh in the saddle and, love him or loathe him, there’s no denying the place just won’t be the same without him.
His partnership with equine greats like Kauto Star, Big Buck’s, Master Minded, Hurricane Fly, Faugheen and Quevega will live long in the memory, and his record of 59 festival winners will surely never be surpassed.
Walsh obviously had the mighty Paul Nicholls and Willie Mullins stables behind him as he mopped up Grade 1 after Grade 1, but they still had to be steered home in front and his coolness in the saddle was rarely matched.
Mullins and fellow Irish trainer Gordon Elliott have made the festival their own in recent seasons and they travel with plenty of live chances again, and along with leading home hope Nicky Henderson they’re sure to be vying for the top trainer prize.
However, some of the more memorable and emotional highlights of the festival are sure to be provided by the lesser lights in the training ranks.
In the past Galway handler Pat Kelly has brought the house down by saddling Mall Dini and Presenting Percy (twice) to success, and Paul Nolan galloping with joy at the side of the track to greet 20/1 shot Dabiroun’s victory in the Fred Winter Juvenile Novices Hurdle 2005 will be forever looked back on with fondness. Fellow Wexford trainer Colm Murphy also took on the heavyweights and won with Brave Inca and Big Zeb and he and Nolan will be back this time around looking to add those glory days.
Horses like Brave Inca are what makes Cheltenham so special as he returned to the Champion Hurdle in 2006, after finishing third the previous year, and bravely outbattled Macs Joy and the twice previous winner Hardy Eustace to land the prize under iron man Tony McCoy.
Unlike flat racing, these equine greats return year after year and the public develop a great affinity for the horses. Names like Desert Orchid, Istabraq, Denman, Moscow Flyer and Best Mate canter through the mind as we remember their remarkable feats on the biggest stage of all.
More wonderful equine tapestries will be weaved this week and I for one will feel fortunate to watch it taking shape in a myriad of colour.
Hopefully my luck will continue for the four days of Cheltenham and I’ll back a few winners.
If not, at least I’ll be able to stare out the window and admire my freshly manicured lawn.