Quality racing beats recession blues
Most days you go to a meeting you will invariably hear from a National Hunt trainer, or two, that the number of horses they have is well down on previous seasons and about the growing difficulty of getting money in for at least some of them.
You only have to look at the entries for various meetings to quickly realise the massive change taking place.
For many years the dreaded balloting system was the scourge of the National Hunt trainer. If current trends continue, the need for balloting may well disappear.
For instance, no balloting was necessary for Clonmel today and there was no need to facilitate reserves either.
The entries for Punchestown on Saturday, and Punchestown and Cork on Sunday, are more than manageable and give every indication that the days when many races were filled with virtual dross are well and truly over.
Cork is a particularly good example. Alright there may be 48 in the four and five-year-old maiden hurdle, but the six-year-old and up maiden hurdle has only 18 and the bumper just nine. I’ll guarantee you now the programme will be all the better for it.
Back to Cork in a second, but for the moment let’s have a look at Punchestown. We know Hurricane Fly is going to make his seasonal debut in the Grade 1 Morgiana Hurdle and, for good measure, Sizing Europe runs in a Grade 2 Chase.
Hurricane Fly is the most exciting hurdler in the country, but how fired up will Willie Mullins have him?
Mullins, not unlike Aidan O’Brien on the flat, trains his horses with the overall picture and long-terms goals in mind.
Getting a third look at Sizing Europe over fences will be worth the entrance money alone. It would be ridiculous, given the horse’s past history, to be getting too carried away with him just yet.
But he has produced two faultless and brilliant exhibitions over fences, both at Punchestown, and you can only cross the bridge as you go!
Cork will house the previously postponed paddypower.com Grand National on Sunday and the three and a half mile grueller has attracted 18 entries, including the possibly well handicapped, and Willie Mullins-trained, Our Monty.
Overall, it has the appearances of a strong card and, hopefully, will beat the weather on this occasion.
* WHAT did you think of the Breeders’ Cup? Personally, I think it’s great entertainment, frivolous and relaxing, but to be almost totally ignored when it comes to punting.
Disappointingly, once again, it was a bit of a disaster from a Ballydoyle point of view and you’d wonder just how serious they are about the whole thing?
Perhaps, they are deadly serious and simply cannot get it right. That said, there weren’t too many cockfights Rip Van Winkle and Mastercraftsman missed through a long campaign and the Breeders’ Cup was surely never regarded among their main targets.
Likewise, I doubt if many punters in this country had much faith in either Alfred Nobel or Beethoven delivering.
Admittedly, Lillie Langtry was a strong posisbility, but, of course, she suffered an injury in her race.
* COMING back from Limerick on Monday evening I was listening to RTE 1 when they gave us the sports news a little after 5.30.
I’ve noticed of late that RTE, both radio and television, are giving racing a bit more coverage, and that’s, obviously, to be welcomed.
But if they are not going to do it right, then they’d be better off not to bother at all. Michael Lyster was anchoring the sport and, very kindly, decided to treat us to the results from Limerick.
So off he went. He told us Rigour Back Bob had won the first race. No Michael, he didn’t. He won the second contest and you didn’t give us the first result at all.
Then he informed listeners that Call The Police landed the third. Well, in a manner of speaking he did, although dead-heating with Ambrosia’s Promise.
Hey, if you were out digging ditches all day, maybe you might have been able to guess that’s what happened!
Then another winner, Templetown Hill, I’m reasonably certain, was announced as an 11-4 shot. Close, he was 14-1!
I was telling someone about it the other day and he swears he heard a representative of RTE radio, this time a female, tell the public about a winner recently which was returned at 11-7!
