‘We’ll never forget him’ – O’Connell family pay tribute to Un De Sceaux

RIP: Un De Sceaux has died at the age of 18. Pic: Photo Healy Racing.

The owners of Un De Sceaux have remembered their “horse of a lifetime” following news of his death at the age of 18.

A 10-time Grade One-winner for Willie Mullins, he suffered what was described as a freak accident at the stud farm in France where he had enjoyed a happy retirement.

Colm O’Connell, whose family bought Un De Sceaux privately in France as a four-year-old, told the Press Association on Tuesday: “My head is a bit all over the place to be honest, my phone hasn’t stopped since the news broke and it’s only really now that I’ve started to remember all his great days.

“It’s very sad what happened, it was a freak accident and in some ways what caused the accident was the way the horse was, he was just full of beans.

“I remember being on the gallops at Willie’s one day and Un De Sceaux was supposed to be going up eighth in his lot. But all he saw was seven horses in front of him and he wanted to be first – everything was a race to him!

“He was a maverick, there was a bit of Eric Cantona about him. Everybody liked Eric because he was a bit crackers, it’s the same with many sports stars, we like the mercurial ones and he was certainly that.

“From a very early stage in his journey we realised we’d never have another one like him so we’ve never really looked. We’d owned plenty of average horses so when he came along we were very happy to go along for the ride.

“He ran at five Cheltenham Festivals in a row (winning twice) and when it was time to leave the paddock and people were going out to watch I’d say I was staying there as you just knew he wouldn’t be out of the first three!

“He had some constitution, there was never a vet’s bill. I remember one year he was due to run in the Clarence House at Ascot, but it was called off – he went back home to Ireland, the race was rearranged for a week later at Cheltenham, he travelled back over and still won.”

While he was a dual Cheltenham Festival winner, in the Arkle and Ryanair, O’Connell rates his three Clarence House wins higher.

“I don’t think that will be done again, you know,” he said.

“I’d love it if they could name a race after him at Ascot or something, I might have to get in touch!

“He was a horse of a lifetime, there’s no doubt about that, he spanned the Sprinter Sacre and Altior eras, won in France a few times, at Punchestown, Cheltenham, Ascot, Leopardstown, Sandown, you name it.

“It will take a while for us to process, we used to get videos sent from France every week of him in the paddock and I kid you not, he was so well on the last one you’d be thinking he was still in training.

“We’ll never forget him and I’m going to enjoy reading all about him again over the next few days.”