Big Gossey swoops late to claim remarkable 10th victory at the Curragh
FAN FAVOURITE: Big Gossey, with Billy Lee up, on their way to winning the Jebel Ali Racecourse and Stables Dash. Pic: Thomas Doolin/Sportsfile.
Arguably the biggest cheer of Irish Derby day came not in the Classic but in the Jebel Ali Racecourse & Stables Dash Stakes as Big Gossey swooped late in the hands of Billy Lee to claim a remarkable 10th victory at the Curragh.
The 5-2 favourite looked to be facing an impossible task a furlong out but flew home in the final 150 yards to beat Tango Flare by three-quarters of a length.
“He’s becoming sort of a cult figure around here,” winning trainer Charles O’Brien said of the nine-year-old grey.
“I only walk into the racecourse and people are coming up to me wishing me well. ‘God he’s great, I hope he wins again’, that sort of thing. He’s got his own little fanbase. He gets on great with Billy too, the two of them are made for each other.”
Reflecting on Big Gossey’s love affair with the Curragh, O’Brien added: “They are not easy won these races; they are all on big days. He’s been at every Guineas and Derby festival, and he’ll come back here for the Oaks festival. It’s not like he’s picking up soft races.”
Genesis gave Mick Mulvany a fifth Curragh success of the season when getting back to winning ways in the Rockingham Handicap.
Successful over six furlongs at this venue on his seasonable reappearance early last month, Genesis was a 25-1 shot for this five-furlong contest on the back of three subsequent winless runs but he used his pace to establish a commanding lead a furlong out. He began to tie up late on but the line came just in time, a neck separating him from the fast-finishing Sarahmae.
Mulvany said: “He’s shocking pacey at home and that’s why I said I’d bring him back to five furlongs. We tried him at Cork the last day, it was his first time at it, and I’d say it was a shock to the system.
“Before this we’ve been riding him to try and get home but today I said to Wesley [Joyce, jockey] to go out there and ride him from the front. He did everything that he was asked.”
Galway is next on the agenda for Pierre Royal after the Ado McGuinness-trained Kingman gelding ran out a smooth winner of the Dubai Duty Free Derby Festival Handicap.
Formerly trained by Dermot Weld, Pierre Royal finished down the field at Limerick on his first start for McGuinness but was backed from a morning price of 40-1 into 12-1 and duly delivered under Adam Caffrey.
McGuinness said: “We love Ballybrit so I’d say that will be our next port of call. Then Champions Weekend and then we might have to get our suncream!” Johnny Murtagh was on the mark in the Dubai Duty Free Celebration Stakes as 4-1 shot Zodiac Bear made all in the hands of Ben Coen.
“It’s always great to have a winner here on Derby day at the Curragh,” Murtagh said. “It’s more relief than anything else because you know how hard it is to get here and how hard it is to get the horses here. Then everything has to go well in the race.”
He added: “It wasn’t the plan to make the running today but that’s what good jockeys do, take the initiative and ride them what way they think is best. That’s what Ben did.”
The William Haggas-trained King Of Earth won the penultimate race, the Tulfarris Hotel And Golf Resort Maddenstown Handicap, the 4-1 favourite scoring in the hands of Time Marquand before 9-1 shot In My Teens rounded off proceedings by landing the Dubai Duty Free Irish EBF Ragusa Handicap for Gavin Cromwell and Gary Carroll.
