Power surge helps Robbie strike gold
IRISH LAND TOP PRIZE ON ST PATRICK’S DAY
THINGS did not work out for the biggest certainty of the 2017 Cheltenham Festival when Douvan finished seventh in Wednesday’s Queen Mother Champion Chase but he still played a major role in the outcome of the feature Timico Gold Cup.
Had Sizing John not got a headache clashing with the Willie Mullins gelding over two miles, Sizing John might have spent his career racing at that distance.
But a 0-7 record against his nemesis, including defeat in last year’s Arkle Chase, prompted a strategy change.
While Douvan was recuperating from a stress fracture of his pelvis, Sizing John emphatically proved he was far more than jump racing’s most unlucky bridesmaid.
Appropriately an Irish winner in a St Patrick’s Day Gold Cup, the 7-1 shot landed a £327,000 first prize by two-and-three- quarter lengths from staying on Minella Rocco with game Native River a further short head back in third.
Sizing John was a 10th Festival winner for Jessica Harrington, who has won both the Champion Hurdle (Jezki, 2014) and Champion Chase (Moscow Flyer, 2003 and 2005). But it was her first ever runner in the Gold Cup.
Harrington, who represented Ireland in three- day eventing at the Olympics, joins Jenny Pitman and Henrietta Knight as successful female Gold Cup trainers.
For jockey Robbie Power, son of international showjumper Con Power, it was a fourth Festival win and one he treasured more than his 2007 Grand National victory on Silver Birch.
‘I am 35 now,’ he said. ‘I was 25 when I won the Grand National. I thought I was going to win everything in racing. When you get to 35, you are not so confident.’
Power’s input had been crucial to stepping up Sizing John in distance after he had finished behind Douvan over Christmas. The jockey’s season has been disrupted by injury. He broke his cheekbone and eye socket in a fall at Galway and ruptured a disc in his back in January.
But he was determined to be back to ride Sizing John in his first successful attempt at three miles in the Irish Gold Cup at Leopardstown last month.
Power, who plotted a groundsaving inside run and hit the front two out, said: ‘I always thought that when Sizing John stepped up in trip it would be the making of him. I’ve had a lot of confidence in this horse from the first day I rode him. I felt all he did was stay. We went gradually to two and a half miles and then three in the Irish Gold Cup, and then up to three and two furlongs today.’
Despite Power’s gut feeling, it had ultimately been the input of owners Alan and Ann Potts which had ensured Sizing John took his place in the race.
Yorkshireman Potts, who has made his fortune in the mining industry and also now has horses with Colin Tizzard, sent Sizing John to Harrington in the autumn when he moved his string from Henry de Bromhead.
Harrington said: ‘If Douvan had not been around he would still probably have stayed at two miles. I wanted to go for the (2m 5f) Ryanair Chase. I thought he was guaranteed to win that but Alan wanted to go for the Gold Cup.’
Harrrington and Power, also successful with Potts- owned Supasundae in Wednesday’s Coral Cup, later combined to land the concluding Johnny Henderson Grand Annual Challenge Cup Handicap Chase with Rock The World. It was a fifth win of the day for Ireland who thumped the home team with a best ever 19 wins to nine over the four days.
For much of the Gold Cup, it looked like Djakadam would win under Ruby Walsh. But hopes of a first Gold Cup to add to the six second-places for trainer Willie Mullins ended when he thumped the penultimate fence.
Mullins might have traded his fifth and sixth winners of the meeting — Paul Townend-ridden pair Artic Fire in the Randox Health County Handicap Hurdle and Penhill in the Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle — but Walsh reckoned the error ‘probably cost me second’ but not victory.
Mullins also conceded his Festival trainer’s title to Gordon Elliott. Both had six wins but the latter more places.
Outside the Gold Cup winner, the best story was the safe return of Cue Card. The Tizzard crowd favourite crashed out at the third last for the second year running. The only difference was that this time he was already well beaten.