MACNIFICENT
Swiney on track for Derby as Bolger admits: I was worried
MAC SWINEY got up from his sick bed to lead home a Jim Bolger onetwo in the Tattersalls Irish 2,000 Guineas – and roar back into the Cazoo Derby reckoning.
The son of the training legend’s 2008 Derby hero New Approach suffered from a nasal discharge for a week after his flat fourth to Bolshoi Ballet in the Derrinstown Stud Derby Trial at Leopardstown earlier in the month.
But the chestnut, carrying the silks of Bolger’s wife, Jackie, showed himself to have made a full recovery as he made all the running under jockey Rory Cleary – the 33-year-old registering his first success at Group 1 level – to deny stablemate Poetic Flare by a short head in the one-mile test.
“It’s a big day,” said the 79-year-old Bolger (above), who admitted to fears the 13-day time frame separating Mac Swiney’s first two races of 2021 might prove too narrow. “I was worried about doing it, but it was the only place where he could prove his fitness for Epsom.
“If he’d finished in the first four I’d have been happy with him, knowing that he was back on track for Epsom.
“To win it, then, is beyond expectations.
“It’s brilliant for Rory, a way-underestimated jockey. But we never underestimated him here, and I’m more than happy to have him.
“He gives us great service. He’s a terrific work-rider and he’s a great judge – he’s a complete horseman.”
Bolger, capturing yesterday’s race for the first time, will now consider giving Poetic Flare, winner of the QIPCO 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket on May 1 before a below-expectations sixth in Poule d’Essai des Poulains at ParisLongchamp last Sunday, a break.
“He’s the real deal and he certainly proved his durability and his ability,” added the Coolcullen handler.
“We’ll see how he comes out of this. I have to bear in mind that we’ve been asking him to dig deep.” But Mac Swiney will return to action at Epsom, where he will tackle an additional four furlongs for the first time, in 13 days.
“If he stays a mile and a half, which I think he will, he’ll be brilliant because he’s proven now that he has three-yearold mile speed and that will be a huge asset in any middle-distance race,” predicted Bolger, whose colt is an 8-1 shot with Ladbrokes.
Yesterday’s card had to overcome a 7.30am inspection after rain rendered the Curragh surface ‘unraceable’ on Friday, and the going had also ridden heavy at Doncaster for Mac Swiney’s success in the Group 1 Vertem Futurity Trophy last October.
But Bolger believes quicker terrain at Epsom will be no hindrance to the winner, who takes his name from Terence MacSwiney, the Irish playwright and politician who during the Irish War of Independence, died in Brixton Prison after a 74-day hunger strike in October 1920.
“The strange thing about the going for him – and all the commentary about it – is that we always thought that he was a good-ground horse,” added Bolger.
“I haven’t seen anything to tell me that he’s not – I’d be perfectly happy with good ground.”
It’s brilliant for Rory. We never underestimated
him here