Every Tuesday between now and Cheltenham - and the meeting begins in just three weeks - leading owner and BetBright Chairman Rich Ricci pens a countdown blog. Neither he nor trainer Willie Mullins have won a Cheltenham Gold Cup but Ricci is hoping Djakadam will slip below the radar in the biggest festival race of all.
It's scarcely believable - just three weeks to go and the tapes will be up for the Supreme Novices' Hurdle. No bad news to report this week and if we can keep that trend going for just a little while longer, it would be fantastic.
Willie and I will have a get-together one of these days and try and finalise where we’re going to go with different horses. We’ve been very fortunate over the last few years and in most cases the choices were self-evident; whereas this year, with a reduced team, it will be much about finding the right race for the right horse. That might be frustrating for people who would love to know now where this horse runs and that horse goes, but we have to be patient and make the right call.
Last year we had a very good strike rate and most of our horses ran into the money. This year’s team isn’t nearly as big - we’ll probably have something in the region of a dozen runners - and we’ll only bring the horses we think can be competitive.
The one horse that I’m hoping will slip nicely under the radar is Djakadam in the Gold Cup.
I don’t mind hearing from Willie in the evenings - that usually means that something has worked well or he has found a horse he wants me to buy. But a call in the late morning or lunchtime is never good news. It’s nerve-wracking!
My good friend Michael Buckley is going through the same thing right now. He has won a Champion Chase among other races but has also endured a lot of hard luck in racing over the years. Understandably both he and Nicky [Henderson] are very positive about Brain Power’s chances in the Champion Hurdle.
We’re all competitive and want to win, but this is a sport too, and recognising achievement and performance, whether you own the horse or not, is central to why we all love the game. I don’t know if we’ll have a runner in the race or not but if we don’t, I’d love to see ‘Buckles’ win the big one!
If Michael goes to bed dreaming of Champion Hurdle glory, I’m doing something similar for the big race on the Friday. The one horse that I’m hoping will slip nicely under the radar is Djakadam in the Gold Cup.
The race looks a bit different today after that terrible news about Thistlecrack earlier but I still think that Colin Tizzard has a wonderful chance of winning the race with Native River and Cue Card. Colin has done such a brilliant job - not just in preparing his horses but also in dealing with connections of those horses and the media. I have lots of time for him. But this year, as opposed to last year, we’ve had a clean run with Djakadam. We know he gets the trip and he gets around Cheltenham very well.
Last year he fell in the BetBright Trial at Cheltenham and we had a terrible rush to get him back for Cheltenham - Willie and the team did an extraordinary job to produce him in such form.
Colin has two very strong contenders; Gigginstown have an arsenal; and there are many more lurking too. But this year it has been far smoother and his prep has gone to plan. He goes there a fresh horse with 11 weeks from Leopardstown to Cheltenham and we are quietly purring away in the background daring to dream.
In a year like this - with so much bad news since Christmas - I just want to keep the head down and get him there. To be honest I’ve moved away from my usual anticipation and excitement and just want to grind it out for three weeks and see what happens on the day.
We have a nice midweek distraction tomorrow at Punchestown when Limini makes her return in the Quevega Hurdle. She’s in good form and is a much stronger mare this season but it will be a tough gig tomorrow because she’s running over a new trip - 2m4f - and takes on a really good mare in Apple’s Jade. Our girl will need the run, for sure, and will come on for it, so it’s not so important that we win or lose tomorrow the main thing is we run well. How we define that, I don’t know, I suppose it depends on how Apple’s Jade runs!
Limini is another in that category where she could end up in a couple of races at Cheltenham: she is favourite with some bookmakers for the County Hurdle and has options like the Mares Hurdle on the Tuesday too. Tomorrow - and that new trip - will hopefully tell us plenty and point us in the right direction.
For us the past week was a quiet one but a good one. Ballycasey won the Red Mills on ground he hated and might line up in the Ryanair Chase as a lively outsider. He is a 10-year-old now so what are we waiting for! He’s a horse who ran really well in a hot handicap chase at the festival last year so that kind of trip on the likely better ground should suit him nicely.
In the lull of these few weeks before Cheltenham something has to fill the void I suppose, and last week it was handicaps and handicappers’ interpretations!
Obviously Michael [O’Leary] was very unhappy with the weights handed to his horses for Aintree.
I understand Michael’s point but I don’t have a dog in the fight. That will change in the next week or so as the handicap entries are finalised for Cheltenham and we’ll see what happens with the latest marks for our horses when they are published.
Our approach has always been the same. We campaign our horses a lot like Michael and Eddie do: they all start off in the novice and open races and eventually find their level. It often means we have a lot of horses betwixt and between, but that’s just the way it goes. Sometimes if we have a well-handicapped horse it will happen on the back bad run in a good race. If our horses get a mark we think is fair for Cheltenham, we will run; if not they stay at home.
Max Dynamite could be the exception because you’d imagine that he remains a horse well-handicapped over hurdles. As I said last week, he faces a race to be ready for Cheltenham but we haven’t put a line through him yet! Koshari hasn’t run since November but is the type of horse I’d like to think would run well in one of the handicaps and what about Arbre De Vie? Although still a maiden he had his form franked by Acapella Bourgeois at the weekend and he could be one for the handicaps off his current mark or even a horse that might be suited by taking in the four-miler on the Tuesday of the festival.
Elsewhere all of our novices are fine and will keep their entries at the next forfeit stage. That includes the long-forgotten Senewalk, who is back in training after getting his wind done. He will be a much better horse on better ground and we still retain loads of faith in him, but the reality is he is a maiden over hurdles, has only had the one run, and will probably not make Cheltenham at this stage.
This weekend we - BetBright that is - will announce our team captains for the BetBright Cup and I hope everybody will be excited by our choices. I think it adds that extra element to the festival and last year was as close as it ever was. As I’m involved in the sponsorship of the competition I have to remain partial.... yeah right, come on Ireland!
*BetBright sponsor the BetBright Cup, a competition marking the intense rivalry between Irish-trained horses at Cheltenham, and the home contingent.
