RACING FOR FUN’S 50-1 SHOT
THE backing track as odds-on favourite Paisley Park faded out of contention in the Paddy Power Stayers’ Hurdle was the ‘Sound of Silence’ in the packed grandstands, but the seven-strong Racing For Fun syndicate didn’t care.
They had just hit the jackpot with Rebecca Curtis-trained 50-1 shot Lisnagar Oscar — the winner paid £85.70 on the Tote — in what felt like Throwback Thursday.
In the days before multimillionaires from the worlds of industry, commerce and finance changed the face of jump racing ownership, ordinary men and women from all corners of Britain and Ireland won big races at the Festival.
They are collector’s items now and this one will be treasured by Andrew Spencer, one of the seven celebrating owners of the gelding who gave jockey Adam Wedge his first Festival winner.
Doncaster-based Spencer — who repairs train gearboxes for a living and will be back at work on Monday — paid £6,000 for his share. He bought into a racing dream.
Spencer said: ‘This is beyond belief. For the likes of me to be able to participate in something like this is out of this world.
‘I ain’t got loads of money. I’ve just been lucky. We are from all walks of life. We will have a few drinks tonight.’
For Curtis, the win of Lisnagar Oscar was also a surprise. Like most of the Cheltenham crowd, she had expected Paisley Park
MARCUS TOWNEND
AT CHELTENHAM to defend his Stayers’ Hurdle crown, hoping her runner ‘might finish in the first five’.
A useful novice hurdler last season when he won a big race at Haydock and was fifth to Minella Indo in the Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle, Lisnagar Oscar had flirted with novice chasing at the start of the season… without success.
Curtis said: ‘I am speechless really. Last season, he had good form but we tried chasing and it all went wrong. Whether that put him off racing a bit, I don’t know, but he sprang back to form six weeks ago.’
From 2012 when Teaforthree won the National Hunt Chase, Curtis won a race a year for four Festivals. But her fortunes dwindled and she has had to wait for Festival win No 5.
Not so long ago, Curtis was training more than 50 horses. She now has just over 20 and hopes Lisnagar Oscar’s victory will reignite the fortunes of her West Wales stable.
Curtis said: ‘This is just what I needed. I hope I have proved I can do the job a bit and we can build things back.’ Popular mare Apple’s Jade set a searching pace until she was passed on the home turn and headed into retirement. Lisnagar Oscar was always well placed in the chasing pack by Wedge and sealed his win with a good jump at the last for a bookmaker-pleasing result which saw 20-1 shot Ronald Pump finish two lengths second with 33-1 chance Bacardys in third. Back in seventh was Paisley Park.
He lost shoes — not helpful in tacky ground — but the stamina-laden stayer with a turn of foot, who had beaten Lisnagar Oscar four-and-a-half lengths at the track in January, looked leaden-legged when jockey Aidan Coleman asked him to quicken. Trainer Emma Lavelle said: ‘He just seemed to be going through the motions.’
Willie Mullins felt his stable had ‘not had the rub of the green’ on the opening two days of the meeting when his hopes would have been far higher than merely winning the Champion Bumper with Ferny Hollow.
Things did not look any brighter when Melon just missed out in the Marsh Novices’ Chase but things picked up for Mullins after that.
Concertista was the most decisive winner of the meeting so far when a 12-length winner of the Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle 12 months after being a short-head second in the same race. Paul Townend-ridden Min — runner-up to Altior in the 2016 Supreme Novices’ Hurdle and 2018 Champion Chase — held off Saint Calvados by a neck in the Ryanair Chase. Back in third was Rachael Blackmore on favourite A Plus Tard, while Bryony Frost said her 2019 winner Frodon was ‘flat out all the way’. ‘He did well to hang on to fourth,’ she added.
Owner Andrew Brooks just missed out with Saint Calvados, but was successful with well-backed Gavin Sheehanridden Simply The Betts in the Brown Advisory & Merriebelle Plate Chase, a first winner for trainer Harry Whittington.
COPPER GONE WEST suffered a fatal injury in the Pertemps Hurdle Final.