Jane up for an Oscar again despite THAT Devon Loch moment 12 months ago ...
WHEN Jane Mangan asked her lecturers for time off to ride at l ast year’s Cheltenham Festival, she got the impression some of them were sceptical about her request.
That was not an issue when she asked for the same dispensation this week. You’d have needed to exist in a vacuum to not know that the trip across the water was both genuine and dramatic last time out.
The 20-year- old, who is in her second year of a marketing course at Cork IT, was all over the television and newspapers — but not in the way she had dreamed.
The pictures showed her mount Oscar Delta as clear leader after the last fence, then spilling Mangan on the turf yards from certain victory in the CGA Foxhunters Chase. The horse had failed to see the temporary tape preventing him setting out on another lap.
It rekindled memories of the Queen Mother’s Devon Loch, who threw away success in the 1956 Grand National when sprawling on the run-in.
But if the immediate reactions were shock and embarrassment, they were soon overtaken by admiration for the response of the then teenager whose trainer father Jimmy trained 2003 Grand National winner Monty’s Pass. One of the greatest achievements for any amateur jockey had just been snatched away but there were no tears, petulance or any sense of self-pity.
Mangan found an admirable sense of perspective when judging where sporting events rank in life’s greater scheme.
Just 24 hours earlier, fellow Irish amateur JT McNamara had been left paralysed from the neck down when falling from Galaxy Rock. He still remains in hospital a year on.
Mangan said: ‘What happened to John Thomas on the Thursday cast a shadow over the whole Festival. I felt the meeting ended that day. My mam (Mary) had gone to the start with Oscar Delta and was with me very quickly and dad was there a minute or two later. We just wanted to get out of the public place.
‘But the first thing we thought about was how the McNamara family were feeling compared to us. For that to happen to me was unfortunate and a bit of a Devon Loch moment but very superficial if you
i t to John Thomas’s compare situation.
‘I spoke to the journalists but I didn’t do any TV. I could break down in front of the journalists and it would not have appeared all over the paper but if it had been on the TV it would have been a bit different. You just had to laugh and move on.’
Mangan has done that and will once again be on board Oscar Delta on Friday. Just as last year, the 11-year- old gelding’s form in the build-up has been uninspiring but a Foxhunters record of two third places plus the one that got away means his odds are only 8-1.
Mangan said: ‘His runs before Cheltenham have never been good. Last year I all but pulled him up in his last race before the Foxhunters.
‘Mam rides him and she has been very happy with him. It must be the atmosphere or the undulations of the track. He comes to life. I have never known him to travel so well as last year. Hopefully he’ll be rejuvenated this year.’