JP McManus and the hunt for the ‘Great Eight’
MARTINSTOWN MAESTRO: JP McManus already has 83 festival wins to his name, and that figure looks good to swell this week. Pic: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images
If that colossus of the turf, Snow Fairy, deserves a prominent statue overlooking the winner’s enclosure at Leopardstown, then surely JP McManus must have earned at least a half dozen monuments at Cheltenham racecourse.
His contribution to National Hunt racing in general, and the festival in particular, is monetarily incalculable, but with close on 400 horses in training, distributed among more than 60 trainers, it would be safe to say that his contribution has been significant.
The great man is now well into his 70s and immensely wealthy from his enterprises outside racing, but he still enjoys a scrap with the bookies as much as he did when he was making his bones as ‘The Sundance Kid’ back in the 70s. But even if betting ring setbacks are more easily absorbed these days, the enjoyment he derives from owning horses, be it a Grade One superstar or a well-executed plot in a festival handicap, has remained undiminished through the decades.
McManus has had 83 winners at the festival since his first one, Mister Donovan, who took the 1982 equivalent of Wednesday’s Turners Novice Hurdle. JP later admitted "My most important one at Cheltenham must have been the first one, Mister Donovan in 1982. He was needed.”
McManus reportedly relieved the on-course bookies of £250,000 that afternoon, roughly equivalent to about €1.4m these days. He’d seen some heavy gambles go down in flames in the years leading up to that win, particularly with Jack of Trumps and Deep Gale, so his sense of relief was understandable.
His best year at the festival, numbers wise, was in the ‘covid-anxious’ week in 2020 when he owned seven winners. And such is the strength of the war party that he is mobilising in the Cotswolds, he is a very skinny 4/1 to beat that total over the upcoming four days. JP knows more than most who the horses are that might bring him his eight wins. The rest of us are left to guess...
McManus bought The New Lion in the run up to last year’s meeting and what must have been a sizeable investment began its payback early when he beat The Yellow Clay and Final Demand to win the Turners Novice Hurdle. McManus has already won the Champion Hurdle nine times and is hoping that The New Lion will push him into double figures. In truth, he’s an accidental favourite in that State Man and Sir Gino are injured and Constitution Hill has gone off to star in a soap opera and won’t be running over hurdles again. The New Lion only run twice since last year, falling in the Fighting Fifth and winning the International Hurdle in ho-hum fashion at Cheltenham in January. He has a solid chance but is very far from being a banker.
An absolute specimen of a racehorse, Majborough seems to have been around forever, despite being only six years old and a relative baby in terms of being a Champion Chase favourite. He won the Triumph as a juvenile hurdler two years ago and was only beaten by his bad jumping when a close up third in last year’s Arkle Chase to Nicky Henderson’s big hope in Friday’s Gold Cup, Jango Baie. Majborough’s dodgy jumping seemed to be his Achillies heel until last month’s Dublin Chase at the Dublin Racing Festival when wearing cheekpieces for the first time he barely touched a twig when winning by 19 lengths. Marine Nationale, who was second that day, is out with a sore neck and only 13 fences stand between JP and his first winner of the Champion Chase. .
McManus won the Gold Cup for the second time last year with Inothewayurthinkin whose prospects for a repeat have looked bleak all season following bad run after another. But he is a spring horse with a target trainer and there are rumours that he is ‘just grand’ again since he’s seen the daffodils sprout. Spillane’s Tower is another JP runner in the big race and would be a cherished winner for a couple of reasons. Firstly, he was bred by Mrs Noreen McManus and secondly, he is only one of ten horses trained by one of the most popular men in the game, Jimmy Mangan. Disappointing last year, Spillane’s Tower won the Cotswold Chase at Cheltenham in January and looks as though the canny Jimmy has timed his run well for Friday’s blue riband. .
Speaking of popular trainers from North Cork, Connor King a native of Kilbrin has a decent chance of taking the Brown Advisory with Oscars Brother, a recent purchase by JP who will carry the green and gold hoops for only the second time on Wednesday. Jimmy Mangan’s small place looks like Closutton compared to King's horse yard, but Oscars Brother is an athletic eight-year-old who stays well, goes on any ground, and is improving with every outing. He has won his last three starts in staying chases, including a couple of grade two contests at Punchestown and Navan and a win for the archetypical small trainer would light up the Cotswolds and create a story for the ages. .
The depth of emotional turbulence brought by the festival was transparently evident for Gordon Elliot following Wodhoow’s win in the Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys’ Handicap Hurdle, the final of race of last year’s festival. It was his only win of the week and even a hard man like him couldn’t hold back tears of relief, joy, and frustration after finally breaking down the door of the winner’s enclosure.
It will be a major surprise if the torture is repeated for the Meath man this time around and he’s double handed in the Stayers Hurdle with the favourite Teahupoo, and the McManus owned Honestly Policy. Lightly raced and slightly under the radar coming into the festival, he has only run once this season when an eye-catching third at Ascot in January. Honesty Policy was a top-class staying novice hurdler last year looks to be a ‘spring horse’ and should get the decent ground he prefers.
Like Oscars Brother, Old School Outlaw has only run once in the McManus colours and is also trained by Gordon Elliot. She was bought following the second of her three seasonal wins at Naas a couple of weeks before Christmas after she beat last year’s dual Champion bumper winning mare Bambino Fever a half a length in what looked to be a fair and square outcome. These two promising six-year-olds should have Thursday’s race between them and although Bambino won next time out, so too did Old School Outlaw in a classier looking grade three contest at Fairyhouse at the beginning of February. Elliot says that “she has a good attitude, and I loved the way she quickened from the last to the line. She’s one I’m really looking forward to running. She’s improving the whole time and she’s a nice mare.”
Surprisingly, the great Willie Mullins has only won the Triumph on five occasions, although he eventually got his act together and has won it for the last for years on the trot, including with the McManus owned Majborough a couple of years ago. The partnership looked nailed on for a repeat this time around when the season’s best juvenile by far, Narciso Has, destroyed a good field at the Dublin Racing Festival but went wrong soon afterwards and unfortunately may be out for the rest of the season. Proactif is not a bad first sub. Bought from France after winning a hurdle contest in the autumn, he just oozed class when beating his better fancied stablemate Macho Man at Fairyhouse in January and looks like he has plenty of improvement left in the tank. .
An hour and a half before the Gold Cup challengers head to post, Dinoblue will start a short-priced favourite at around 6/4 to repeat last year’s victory in the Mare’s Chase. The nine-year-old is a rock-solid dependable performer and already a winner of eleven races including five of her last six starts. She easily won a soft prep race at Naas last month and Frank Berry, JP McManus’ long time and trusted consigliere, said: "She’s a great bit of stuff, she turns up every day. You could set your clock by her.” Probably JP's banker this week.
