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I am not sure that Epsom will suit I’m The One given that she was caught a bit flat footed when the pace quickened and she also hung badly off the home turn.
Yes the experience will have done her a world of good but the Oaks may come a bit too soon for her and she might be a Ribblesdale/Irish Oaks filly better suited to a bigger more conventional and galloping track.
Winner looks nice and considering how big she is she handled Chester with no problem which would suggest that Epsom wouldn’t hold too many fears for her. This was her first run beyond 8F which given that her full brother won the Chester Cup is a little surprising but I find it hard to think the places would be reversed as some on the ITV panel are suggesting.
Given she got in a right sweat behind the stalls, the leeway the pacemaker was given and the fact that a lot of Aidan’s horses have been beaten and looked badly in need of their first runs of the season, I was pleasantly surprised by today’s performance.
Think the Arc could be closer especially if it is not run on bottomless ground like last year, fillies can improve markedly more than the colts from 3 to 4 and with the weight allowance too, I am not sure he has as much in hand even if he is a better 4 yr old than 3 yr old.
Daryz’s only bad run was on good to firm at York and in any case (all things being equal) we may very well see them clash earlier at Royal Ascot against Ombudsman in the Prince of Wales……that would be the race of he meeting for sure.
Having a prep run was a huge help as a lot of Aidan’s first time out have been found wanting for fitness and Precise was the same today. Winner looks a sprinter but had no problems at a mile.
The one I would take out of the race is the 5th placed Abashiri on just her second lifetime run (first on turf after a Kempton maiden win) she was all over the place going into the dip to the extent that Buick was very unbalanced himself but she kept on nicely once meeting the rising ground under gentle handling.
Given the ammunition JP has and Cobden can only ride one horse per race, why wouldn’t he continue riding especially when JP’s first string doesn’t always win a lot of the time.
Yes he will not be riding the marquee horses (unless JP is double handed in races or has entries at multiple meetings or Cobden is injured and/or suspended) but he would still be riding a lot better quality horses than if he went out on his own.
Given the truly professional and classy way he dealt with losing the job and that he continued riding winners as the job came to an end, JP would be crazy not to use him as a back-up whenever/wherever possible.
No reason for him to retire unless his heart is now not really in it and if that is the case you do just walk away….pretty sure JP would have a job for him somewhere in his organisation, hell he would be a far better addition in the role that that misery chops AP currently does.
If you don’t have the top class horses to fly the flag with then you are at a big disadvantage because your only other option is to get a hoard of much lower class horses and run them in all the lower class races and become simply a numbers trainer.
Nicholls has never been that kind of trainer and given the star horses he has had (a lot at the same time or one after another) I don’t see him changing but lets face it the landscape of getting hold of the raw material is now more cuthroat – I believe this is where Mullins has been many steps ahead now by sourcing horses from France like a conveyor belt etc (his last two Champion Hurdlers both being French bred), he is also a bit into the German market too in that Gaelic Warrior is a German bred horse.
Lets not forget though that at one time recruiting French bred horses was an untapped market that Nicholls was farming with the likes of Kauto Star, Big Buck, Azertyuiop, Master Minded, Silviniaco Conti and Neptune Collonges to name a few all coming from there.
I think the top NH horses in general are not as tough or as battle tested as they once were – most of them can’t/won’t run on anything faster than good to soft, most of them can’t run much more than four maybe five times a season (technically today was GW’s first run of the new NH season!) and they are far better catered for with any number of level weight G1s they can run in.
Kauto was a little bit of an anomaly in that he had 41 career starts whereas most of the recent top stars fall into the 20-30 career runs bracket (Gaelic Warrior currently on 23 runs). Best Mate (who had just 22 career starts) I think was the one that really started the trend of minimal runs prior to the Gold Cup (his first win in the race was his 4th and final start of that season with his two subsequent wins being his 3rd and final runs of those respective seasons) and in none of his three Gold Cup years did he run inbetween Christmas and Cheltenham.
When Dessie won his Gold Cup in 1989 it was his 6th start of the season (at trips ranging from 2m to 3m2f and on ground ranging from good to firm….gasp!!! to heavy and after Cheltenham he then went on to Aintree too), in the following year the Gold Cup was again his 6th run of the season and then he went on to Ireland to win the Irish National under 12st.
To put it into perspective, Dessie has actually won more NH races (34) than all of the Gold Cup winners since Long Run (2011) have had total career starts!
In athletics the 100m is the Blue Ribbon event but we don’t downplay the gold medal winner at 1500m or 10,000m and say well they are doing that event only because they are not fast enough for the 100m – each event takes a specifical skill in much the same way that the vast majority of Gold Cup horses are not quick enough to win QMCC and QMCC horses don’t generally have the stamina to win a Gold Cup.
That being said, Dessie finsihed 2nd and 3rd in back to back QMCC but had he not been such an inferior horse racing left handed there is a strong argument that he could/would have become the only horse to win the QMCC and Gold Cup, as he had already won a King George prior to a QMCC run.
Even the Stayers Hurdle takes a specific horse to win it, Big Bucks was an anomally in that he wasn’t a fluent natural chaser (although we really never found out if he could have turned into one because of the switch and the fact that Nicholls already had two Gold Cup horses in Kauto and Denman in the yard).
Also Nicholls had Masterminded and whilst we know Kauto fell in a QMCC do we really think he would have had the raw 2m speed to beat Masterminded in a QMCC, especially the Masterminded that murdered Voy Por Ustedes by 19L in 2008 (the same Voy Por Ustedes who Kauto beat 7L in the 2006 Tingle Creek).
Personally, each Championship race has it own place and has unique requirements to win and as such should not be viewed as a lesser event (just a different one) than the Gold Cup…….my favourite NH horse of all time is the dual Champion Hurdler Sea Pigeon and he also wouldn’t be far off being my all time favourite flat horse either given his insane exploits………he regularly mixed both codes year in year out (no wrapping him in cotton wool) and won 21 of his 40 NH races and 16 of his 45 flat races and did so carrying huge weights in both codes (still holds the Ebor weight carrying record of 10st! when winning in 1979, he was giving the 2nd horse Donegal Prince 40lbs) and he did it on every type of ground.
Apologies for the extremely long and veering slightly off topic post.
Interestingly, GW and IET each hold a victory over each other in their novice chase season, GW won over 2m3f by 5L whilst IET got his revenge when they raced over 2m winning by 2L.
Think we need a decider but I ampretty sure connections (and more likely Willie) will keep them seperated as IET is most likely to go same route as this season (i.e. Clonmel Oil Chase and then Tingle Creek) whilst GW will likely go John Durkan and then either the King George or the Savills.
Townend lost his whip on the run in at Kempton and he was still only beaten a short head and he pulled far too hard with Patrick at the DRF and still finished 2nd, so maybe they will be looking at unfinished business next season as you would imagine he will take the same route again next season.
It won’t happen but GW against IET in the John Durkan would be a blockbuster of all blockbusters.
Emphatically the best chaser – when he got him to settle early on you knew it was game over.
Not sure this is such a massive blow as Pic D’Orhy (their most high profile horse) is long in the tooth now at 11 and outside of the G2 1965 Chase and G1 Ascot Chase (which he was beaten in both this past season having won both the year before) he is exposed at G1 level and I very much doubt he will do much as a 12 year old (probably his last season racing too).
For the last few seasons Nicholls is really missing that marquee horse(s) and I would imagine that No Drama This End (owned by McNeill Family And Chris & Giles Barber) will be the horse he has his hopes set on (as a novice chaser next season and beyond). He is still in the top 4 trainers regularly even though he hasn’t had a big named horse to spearhead his challenge over that period, so I think he is only missing that vital part of the puzzle that when/if found will see him up there challenging more seriously for a title again.
Lets face it, as incredible a season as Skelton had, it will be even harder to replicate it going forward as it is very rare to have most if not all of your yard contributing in such a way again. Last season he had 194 individual winners (from 1026 runners) but just as impressive is the fact that he also had 148 second place horses, 140 3rd place horses and 128 4th placed horses too.
I find it hard to imagine that he can keep that kind of consistency going especially given that you are only one or two injuries to your best horses short of falling from that lofty height.
Ruby – agreed, considering how much of a tearaway he was to ride over hurdles he has now turned into a true professional and very versatile as he wins on good ground, good to soft and soft ground over trips ranging from 2m to 2m5f.
That January day at Ascot in the Clarence House where we were really starting to fear the worse for him where he was on the deck for so long after that tired looking fall seems an age ago yet was only two runs ago.
CAS – Either somebody must have got their timing mixed up or they wanted to give the fans on the rails a bit longer to see the horses up close but it did seem odd to be at the start almost 10min before the off time especially as it is not like they have a long way to go to the start being that it is after the last fence just before the stands.
Energumene just confirmed as retired after a finishing 3rd over a trip too short for him these days – proper horse and glad he gets out in one piece for hopefully a long and happy retirement.
Wonder what Barry Connell will say now that MN was firmly put in his pace – even with that serious early mistake and being a little sticky over the last two IET was in a different league.
He looked a bit of a plodder last season to be fair and today he was being niggled along at the top of the hill – also quite a fair number of Aidan’s 3 yr old horses coming back this season first time out have looked rather undercooked fitness wise.
A quick look over the shoulder or between their legs after the last would negate having to use the whip when you realise they are well clear and there is always vigorous hands and heels riding they can resort to instead, which wouldn’t incur the wrath of stewards for not riding out properly either.
