Jubilant Nolan enjoys a most Noble victory
Whoever said it, they were predicting revolution.
Yesterday’s English uprising was no storming of the Bastille but five straight home wins was still ruthlessly effective in wresting back Prestbury Park for queen and country after Paul Nolan’s Noble Prince claimed the opener for Ireland.
Nolan, for one, won’t have let the subsequent turn of events rain on his parade on a day he described as one of the best of his life after AP McCoy and his seven-year old secured the Jewson Novices‘ Steeple Chase.
“It’ll all calm down in the next couple of days but it’s just great to be among the winners,” said the man from Davidstown, just outside Enniscorthy. “You’d see the earlier celebrations with the lads that you’d be delighted for, but it’s just great to do it yourself as well because it just keeps you up there.”
Nolan reported on Wednesday that Noble Prince had negotiated the journey over to Gloucestershire in good spirits and that the step up in trip and ground would help his charge put in a respectable performance but he never counted on this.
“You’re never confident going to any race because there’s so many things that can happen. From travelling over to getting here to everything going right it’s just ... to see the lads, the pressure going with the like of Hurricane Fly and all. It’s just great to get them here in one piece.”
It’s been some wait for this, Nolan’s second festival win. Six, long years have swung by since Nina Carberry brought Dabiroun home first for him in what was a clear-cut win in the Fred Winter Juvenile Handicap Hurdle.
That’s six years of fragile hopes and shattering disappointments.
“It’s great to get in here and finish in the first four and not to go over to, as I call it, jail. In the long-face parade ring. It even gets mucky in there with the water splashing around, so your shoes are in shit, your stockings the whole lot. And you feel the same.
“We’ve had a couple of long faces here for the last couple of years with Alpha Ridge and Shinrock Paddy and it’s great to bounce back with this fella to keep us happy again. This trip seems to suit him. I think he’d have been off his head in the Arkle once the ground gets like that. He definitely wants the trip on ground like that.”
NOBLE PRINCE’S victory brought Ireland’s quota for the week to 10, equalling after just 15 races the highest number claimed by the raiders at this festival back in 2006, when it took all of 24 runnings to rise to such heights.
“It’s an incredible week for the nation and we’d want it. Hopefully racing will still stay strong and we all stay healthy and well. And that’s it. What more can we say? Wednesday was unbelievable.
“You’re coming over and you’re saying ‘will we get a winner at all?’ And when it all unfolds then, it puts a pep in your step when you get back home. When you’re going racing every day, at least you can go meet the lads and have a smile on your face.”
Not that Noble Prince always seemed destined for greatness.
He acted as a pacemaker for the great Yeats at Longchamp in October of 2008 before Nolan forked out €15,000 on behalf of owner Des Sharkey later that year and he showed no inclination to depart centre stage for anyone yesterday.
“We bought the horse in France. Just lucky to have a man that’s able to afford to buy a nice horse. Listen, it’s great when it turns out because there’s a lot of money spent on horses that are no good. This fella is good.
“He didn’t win a Group One. He was second in a Group Two. Pacemaker for Yeats. High-class horse. We were delighted to get him. I’d say he’d have cost a lot more. He was a four-year-old when we bought him. He’s not expensive now. No money can buy a day like this. Just delighted.”
So, too, was a certain AP McCoy who finally got to ride his 200th winner of the season and first of the festival.
“It’s much easier riding horses that are going well than those that are not,” said McCoy. “I haven’t ridden many horses for the Nolans, but Dave Roberts (his agent) got me this. “His form was pretty good behind Realt Dubh in the (Irish) Arkle and the better ground helped him today, being by Montjeu.”
