Conor’s hard yards
One punter did that in considerable style yesterday with a plunge of £200,000 on Hardy Eustace to win Cheltenham's Champion Hurdle.
Hardy lived up to his name in a battling finish with Harchibald and Brave Inca to net the brave gambler a return of £700,000 on his investment and put Dessie Hughes' eight-year old, who has now won at three consecutive festival meetings and will return next year to try and emulate Istrabraq's three Champion Hurdle successes.
Owner Lar Byrne admitted afterwards that he thought the horse's goose was cooked on the run to the line with Harchibald looking most likely to dethrone him, but he could not believe the battling qualities Hardy Eustace displayed to hold off the challenge.
"Dessie Hughes told me two weeks ago that the horse was 110% and yesterday he told me he was 120%, so I knew we were going to go close. We knew it would be a fight among all those good Irish horses and we knew it would be harder than last year, but our fella is built to battle and he never gave it up."
"That's three festivals and three wins and maybe the horse never got the credit he deserved when he won this race last year. But he's shown everyone he's a true champion and, all going well, he'll be back next year to prove it again," he said.
Gasping with the thirst after a race that was every bit as draining for the connections as their horse, Byrne quipped that the champagne he'd had with lunch was "too salty", but it was Chronicle bookmakers who were rightly peppered by that massive pre-race plunge which netted the hardy punter a prize of over 1m.
Not that had any relevance to the winning rider Conor O'Dwyer whose Cheltenham victory scroll now includes two Champion Hurdles and a Gold Cup and who admitted that he thought that Hardy Eustace was beaten when Harchibald pulled upside.
"It was always in the back of my mind that Harchibald might not go up the hill, but I knew my fellow would run all the way to the line, so I showed him the stick and he kept on finding for me."
The delight of the Hardy Eustace connections was in stark contrast to the despair of the Harchibald camp, with jockey Paul Carberry enduring a bout of barracking from the crowd for his handing of the horse.
However trainer Noel Meade defended his pilot, and maintained his horse always had to be held up because he idles once in the lead.
"I thought Paul gave him a brilliant ride. If Harchibald had got to the front anywhere but the last 50 yards, the other horse would have passed him again and would have got back up. But Hardy Eustace was the wrong horse to come up against and he really dug deep. I knew the race was going to be a bit special and I wouldn't be surprised to see them up against each other next year it reminded me a bit of Sea Pigeon and Monksfield years ago," said Meade.
With two second places on the day Wild Passion having been beaten by Arcalis in the opener Meade's phlegmatic attitude was admirable and the Meath handler must wonder will he ever add to his sole Cheltenham success with Sausalito Bay in 1999.
At least the Carberry family had cause for celebration before the afternoon ended as Paul's sister Nina rode her first Festival winner on Dabiroun in the Fred Winter Juvenile Novices' Handicap Hurdle.
Meanwhile, the naysayers got their comeuppance when Graham Wylie broke his Cheltenham duck with Arcalis' victory in the Supreme Novice's hurdle.
Wylie has pumped some £5m into buying a string of national hunt bloodstock which now runs to over 80 horses, all of whom are trained by Howard Johnson in the North-East of England.
And for Irishman Graham Lee, who is Johnson's stable jockey, the victory was particularly sweet, especially having lost here last year on the heavily backed Inglis Drever.
"It was only a steering job, but what a way to break your Cheltenham duck," said Lee. "I've only been back five or six days since breaking my collarbone, but any pain I had going into the race is well and truly gone now. Coming into the meeting I was a festival virgin and I'm delighted I've lost my virginity."
For Johnson and Wylie, however, there was major pressure coming into this meeting to prove that the spending spree they've indulged in over the last two years was not just about getting winners at the Northern tracks, but at the biggest National Hunt Meeting on the planet.
"I'm more pleased for Graham and Howard than myself," Wylie commented. "Graham hadn't had a winner at the meeting before and Howard has been working so hard with his horses. We bought Arcalis as a hurdler and he'll probably be a two mile hurdler next season.
"I have made a big investment in racing, but days like this make it all worthwhile. That was a real thrill and it was stunning to watch the horse at the final fence."
The third element of this racing triumvirate is the understated Johnson, who prefers to call himself a sheep farmer rather than a racehorse trainer and he too was relieved to have got the first Cheltenham winner out of the way.
"I won't say how much we paid for him, but he's ended up a cheap horse. He's won his money back, that's for sure. Not many do that."
For those who've been busy slagging Wylie and Johnson for squandering large amounts of money, this was something of a slap in the face.
And, as Wylie pointed out, Inglis Drever will attempt to put last year's disappointment behind him when he tackles the Ladbroke World Hurdle tomorrow. "I thought he was my best chance of a winner, but we've got the festival winner now and we can relax and look forward to Thursday," he said.
Naysayers beware.
