Newbury murk
Robin Oakley
ASenator unexpectedly defeated in a recent American election called together his aides the next morning. 'Gentlemen,' he declared, 'we all know there is no such thing as an unmitigated disaster. So get out there and mitigate.' After three odds-on favourites, all leading fancies for the Cheltenham Festival, had been defeated at Newbury on Saturday, the mitigation industry was in full flow.
Francois Doumen, trainer of Gold Cup favourite First Gold, beaten into second place by Shotgun Willy, said that when his jockey son Thierry brought First Gold to challenge the vital spark was missing. 'He just could not find his usual second burst of acceleration. We needed a good blow. He was only 80 per cent today.'
After his Flagship Uberalles, favourite for the Queen Mother Champion Chase, had been beaten by the brave mare Function Dream Noel Chance said, 'He likes it good to soft, not a bog and he was never jumping with his usual flamboyance. There's a bit of improvement to come but on this ground 90 per cent was not enough. He didn't jump and if they don't jump in a bog like this they can't run.' And after Behrajan, Henry Daly's hope for the novice chasers' championship at Cheltenham was beaten by Frantic Tan there were similar noises: 'He'll come on for the run ... he was beaten by a good horse to whom he was giving 1Olb.' They were all perfectly reasonable explanations. After watching swans floating under goalposts and ducks swimming across carparks on the way to Newbury I had prepared myself for a few shocks on truly testing ground.
In these pre-Festival days it is always difficult to know whether a Cheltenham-bound horse is 75, or 80 or 90 per cent fit. Trainers like to leave something to work on for the final month. Nobody wanted to leave a Cheltenham victory behind in the Newbury mud. And I was careful to leave most of my betting money in my pocket on such a day at such a time in the racing calendar. The connections of the horses beaten at 8-13, 8-13 and 1-3 will all be hoping that they have lost only a battle, not the war. But here go some famous last words: I will use the money I saved at Newbury to oppose all three of those beaten favourites at Cheltenham.
One of the shrewdest judges I know on a racecourse said to me after Behrajan's defeat that the horse looks too much like a thinker to him. He was on and off the bridle and for the second time has been found wanting when the serious work had to be done at the end of a race. Flagship Uberalles is a better horse on better ground and his trainer Noel Chance has no greater fan than me. But when I discussed Flagship's chances with Noel before last Saturday's race he was not issuing cautionary notes. And, realist that he is, he admitted afterwards that although they would be better in at the weights at Cheltenham with Function Dream it would not be enough to pull them together. He hoped the ground would do that. It was not as though Flagship Uberalles had been beaten at Newbury by a horse specially primed for the day.
Function Dream, who had her usual team of Co. Cork admirers, led by pub owner Tom Walsh and retired priest Father Con O'Shea, to cheer her into the unsaddling enclosure, is Cheltenham-bound too. The mare, who will go to stud after her Cheltenham race, win or lose, improves with every run and has now won five in a row. As for First Gold, the top-rated chaser in Europe, bought by J.P. McManus for upwards of £500,000, let us remember that his conqueror Shotgun Willy is a novice to whom he would have been expected to give nearly a couple of stone in a handicap. Admittedly Shotgun Willy is a very good novice, whom I would see as a respectable each-way bet even now for next year's Cheltenham Gold Cup. And we may have underestimated Shotgun Willy because he ran so badly at Kempton previously. (Trainer Paul Nicholls says that the horse's stringhalt condition makes him unable to perform on right-handed tracks and that he will never send him to one again.) But First Gold should have won even 90 per cent fit. And while I do not share the reservations expressed in some quarters about his jockey Thierry Doumen I do, like others, rather doubt if his flat, economical jumping style is going to prove suitable for Cheltenham fences up and down the hill.
Just two points more from a fascinating day's racing in the murk at Newbury. Let us remember that favourites from fashionable stables did prove capable of winning in the mud five weeks away from Cheltenham. The inexperienced Landing Light, now third favourite for the Champion Hurdle, won the Tote Gold Trophy for the Nicky Henderson-Mick Fitzgerald combination despite looking as green as a spinach salad and being well behind on the first circuit. He will win many more good races on this showing. And at the other end of the scale make a note of Supreme Genotin, who was returning after a 485-day absence and who ran a cracking race in the three-mile handicap hurdle. A 12-year-old from a small stable with form figures which now read 00R/60/0, he just could be a nice each-way prospect in a suitable race soon if he has come back sound.
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