Ruby Walsh: Safety in numbers can get Willie Mullins over the line
Trainers Dan Skelton and Willie Mullins are set for a final day showdown in Sandown. Pic: ©INPHO/Tom Maher
The British National Hunt season was 364 days this term, or 8,736 hours. Willie Mullins has been the defending champion for the whole duration, but if he is to regain his crown, he will only have led the title race for a maximum of two hours and 20 minutes.
That would require a 1-2-3 in the 2.25pm at Sandown and Dan Skelton to draw a blank in the 1.50pm. Timing is everything in life, but even for the man who has Dublin Airport timed to allow for red lights at the two sets he meets from home to the car park barriers in Terminal 2, this is cutting it fine.
One hundred and fifty-five days into the season, on October 1, he trailed Dan Skelton by £447,155, and after 248 days, at the turn of the year, Dan had added £1.3m to push his tally to £1,749,115. Willie was sitting outside the top 50.
Actually, it was in February when Dan broke through £2 million that Willie appeared on any table and sat in 60th with £138,845 total prize money. Cheltenham in November, Newbury in December and Kempton at Christmas had all passed him by as he kept the home fires burning in the winter months while Dan drove his advantage home over his British rivals.
When the Closutton Express descended on Gloucester for what Willie believes to be the business end of the season, and the tapes rose for the Supreme Novices' Hurdle on March 11, Dan Skelton sat on top of the pile with £2,462,315, and Willie was down in 56th having amassed only £196,894.
Four days later, Willie had jumped to fourth but was still £1,214,778 behind the championship leader, who widened that gap by a further £150,506 before they both turned up on Merseyside for the Grand National meeting in April.
Traditionally, Cheltenham would be Willie’s biggest haul of British prize money in the year. Still, if he were to topple Dan, the smaller team sent to Liverpool would have to outdo the A-team sent to Gloucester, and they did by winning £1,487,995 and outscoring March by £261,201.
A £1.3m odd lead was now down to £122,026 with only 21 days left to play. The chase was on, and the prize money and time were there.
Seven days later, that lead was a mere £1,431 as both men left Scotland and faced into the final fortnight or 336 hours, and that’s what it must feel like for Dan as he edges ahead in the run-of-the-mill hours and Willie reels him back in with the odd hour's work here and there where chunks can be won.
Cheltenham, Plumpton, and Perth in mid-April are only this hot when something bigger is on the line, and when Willie Mullins turns up to play at Sandown today, he will have two hours and 20 minutes left of the 8,736 he had to regain his title.
Dan will be leading by at least £65,640, a winner last night at Chepstow could have pushed that to £71,000 , and if Riskintheground wins the 1.50, that could be £91,000 odd. But from there on, he will be on the back foot and relying on his British Counterparts to win the prize money Willie needs. Today is not Willie v Dan; it's Willie v the English trainers because Dan can’t stop him on his own now.
They need Pic D’orhy to take the £45k win prize in the Oakley Chase, stopping Gaelic Warrior from winning. They need Lucky Place or Salver to down Kitzbuhel, and hope Take No Chances can win a chunk in the Select Hurdle to add to Dan’s total.
If he wins the Celebration Chase, Jonbon will mean more to Dan Skelton than Nicky Henderson. Still, he also needs Unexpected Party or Master Chewy to outscore Energumene and Il Etait Temps.
That will leave £175k up for grabs in the Bet365 at 4.10pm, where 50% of the field will run for Willie Mullins, and Dan hopes the other 50 will be running for him. High Class Hero and Lombron are the fresh horses Willie Mullins has put aside for this, and Grangeclare West and Minella Cocooner back them from Aintree, and four who ventured to Ayr for the Scottish National along with O'Moore Park and Dancing City.
If Hoe Joly Smoke, at the foot of the weights, can deliver for the Skeltons, that would nearly be enough. Still, whatever way the results go, even giving Willie a bonanza and Dan a blowout, this battle will go to the end of the Celebration Chase at 3.35pm. In all likelihood, allowing Gaelic Warrior to win, Energumene and Kitzbuhel to both collect the second prize, the title race will go to the Bet365, and the safety in numbers could be the difference. It will be a battle of the calculators for the afternoon, but it adds real spice to what is traditionally a parade of champions.
Eight-thousand, seven hundred and thirty-six hours will come down to three miles, four and a half furlongs, 24 fences, and about eight minutes. There will be a winner and a loser, but the sport is the biggest winner.
When the dust settles, almost every penny of the prize money earned will find its way back into the British or Irish economies. Both men have spent multiples of their gross 10% building the facilities they have, and this year's earnings will go back into their business.
Their jockeys’ gross 10% will go to paying for their lives and building their future, same as their staff percentage, and the little over 70% their owners will have amassed will already be gone on keeping the horses they own that ran and created the show.
Feed, vets, farriers, hauliers, insurers, tack shops and local shops, the circle for the spend is endless before anyone looks at what Cheltenham, Cartmel, Tramore, Punchestown, or Listowel creates locally.
The show has come to Esher in the UK today and will be in Kildare next week, where the Curragh is already taking the overflow of British runners. Willie challenging Dan or Dan holding Willie off only shows this sport needs both sides of the Irish Sea to prosper.
If they worked together, it could be bigger and better because, from Vincent O’Brien in the 50s to Willie Mullins in the present, neither has ever been big enough.
