PATIENCE might be viewed as a virtue in life, but in the world of horse racing, it is a necessity.
In many ways, it feels like a short space of time in which the green, white and red silks of Bective Stud have come to prominence as major players in National Hunt racing. After all, it was only in 2017 that Noel and Valerie Moran registered a first winner as outright owners through Swingbridge in a 0-100 handicap hurdle at Perth, and the couple’s team of quality youngsters has seen them become regulars at the sport’s biggest meetings since.
However, the steady stream of Grade 1 winners that any strong-spending owners crave hasn’t quite flown freely as of yet. Found A Fifty’s impressive Racing Post Novice Chase success at last week’s Leopardstown Christmas Festival marked just the second time Bective has struck in Grade 1 class – bridging a near two-year gap since their breakthrough at the highest level with Ginto in the 2022 Lawlor’s Of Naas Novice Hurdle.
The tide might be set to turn imminently, though. All the Morans’ patience could be rewarded with two Grade 1s in the space of two weeks. In the same race that Ginto enjoyed his finest hour in, Firefox rates a massive player for Bective in tomorrow’s Lawlor’s Of Naas Novice Hurdle, bidding to rubberstamp his Cheltenham Festival credentials. He has looked an outstanding prospect in winning his last four starts on the bounce.
“Despite what you put into it, it’s hard to get Grade 1s in Ireland,” says Noel Moran.
“They’ve been scarce for us and that tells you how competitive it is here, although that’s the way you want to have it in terms of quality racing. You enjoy them all the more when you don’t get them often. Maybe when you’re starting out you do [expect things to happen a little quicker], but when you get six or 12 months into it you see how long it does actually take.
“Before you even get to the track you have to win at the sales, and that’s not easy. The top horses are making serious money, and people are prepared to pay plenty for them, particularly in Ireland.
“It’s great to see because the majority are staying in Ireland. If we didn’t have those people buying in Ireland, these horses could be going across the water. It’s to the benefit of everyone and racing in Ireland that they stay here.”
The Grade 1 contest won by Found A Fifty last week is set to be removed from the calendar in 2024 by Horse Racing Ireland in a broader revamp to the Irish blacktype programme.
Moran insists he can appreciate both sides of the argument when it comes to the removal of the race.
“In fairness, if you look at some of the fields over Christmas in the Grade 1s, some of them were fairly small,” he says.
“I can see why we want to keep it more competitive in Ireland because that’s probably what they have failed to do in Britain. I can see the logic behind it but it also obviously reduces your chances of winning a Grade 1 in Ireland - as if it wasn’t hard enough here!
“There is clearly thought gone into this process and you can see both sides. It just means you have to continue to up your game and keep going. Hopefully there are still a few there to be picked up.”
Riviere D'etel continued a bright festive period for Bective Stud when winning the Grade 3 John & Chich Fowler Memorial Chase on Monday \ Healy Racing
Graded victories with the likes of Zanahiyr, Riviere D’etel, Hollow Games, Queens Brook, Party Central and American Mike have illustrated the continued rise of Bective’s influence on the track, but the Co Meath operation is also making waves in bloodstock circles.
Magic mares
Prolific 11-time Grade 1 winner Apple’s Jade was snapped up by the Morans for €530,000 at the end of her racing career in 2020, while a year later they signed, alongside M.V. Magnier, for top-class mare Benie Des Dieux at €350,000.
The aim is for the offspring of these exceptional racemares to compete in the track in the Bective colours, while Hayabusa - the dam of recent runaway Grade 1 winner Grangeclare West - also calls the stunning 180-acre farm home along with her four foals. There has already been a notable success for the farm, with The Yellow Clay becoming the Morans’ first homebred winner in a Leopardstown bumper last March, quickly followed by a listed bumper success at Limerick.
“With the breeding angle, going forward, I don’t think we’ll be as reliant on the sales,” says Moran, who welcomed a first child, Orla, five months ago with wife Valerie.
“We’d ideally like to have five or six more good mares to breed from over the next two years. At least then we’d have 10 or 12 coming through from our own end every year and you wouldn’t be leaning as much on the sales. It could be more cost-effective too instead of spending 300 or 400 grand for point-to-point winners. We’re happy to mix sales and breeding for the moment and then hopefully breed more going forward.
“It’s exciting to have young horses coming through. I always love to see the new horses running for us. We’ll try to keep building it up over the coming years but we don’t want to be getting into the big scale of anything like 200 horses and upwards. I think it can get out of hand when you reach that sort of stage. For us, it’s a hobby and an interest. We’re not in it to sell. We’re racing and breeding for our own interest.
“With National Hunt breeding, you essentially have to wait six years before the first one comes around. It’s a long wait for the first one, but at least when you get there you will hopefully have another one coming along every year. Hopefully it’s worth it. We have some nice mares and if their offspring are half as good as they were on the track, fingers crossed they won’t be too bad. It’s something to look forward to.”
On one of the star residents at Bective, Moran adds: “It’ll be nice to see the foals out of Apple’s Jade making the track, all being well. Her first foal, by Walk In The Park, has just turned three so we’ve only another year or so to wait. It’s lovely to see the homebreds on the track, especially for everyone who works here at Bective. Myself and Valerie are very grateful to the staff at Bective Stud who work hard and mind the horses for up to six years before they ever even get to Cullentra. And it’s not just the staff at the stud, but also the ones behind the scenes in the office and gardens as well. It’s a team effort to keep it all working.”
Development
As well as enriching his equine talent pools, Moran is eager to enhance Bective’s impressive footprint with the development of a hotel as part of the estate.
“We’re delighted with what we’ve achieved here so far but there’s still a lot more we can do - it’s a work in progress,” he says.
“We started work in September to develop a hotel. We’ve got five or six apartments on site at the stud that are full all the time, but the hotel is further down the estate. There was an old manor house that we’ve now got permission to turn into a hotel.
“It’ll be two and a half years before we get it done. We have plans for 104 rooms but will probably start with around 40 and see how we get on from there. We have no five-star hotel in Meath - we’re probably the only county without one.”
Top-rated accommodation mightn’t be in ready supply in the Royal County, but quality horsemen are - none more so than Gordon Elliott, who trains the vast majority of Bective’s string.
Moran has struck up a close friendship with the multiple Grand National-winning trainer and is regularly seen alongside him at Meath football games, with Bective the main jersey sponsor for the county team. What does Moran believe is the characteristic that makes Elliott stand out in his field?
“He’s very driven, which is the same as myself, to be honest,” says the man who was awarded European Entrepreneur of the Year in 2018 while chief executive of Prepaid Financial Services. The Morans went on to sell that firm for €327 million in 2019, resulting in a payout of €266 million to the couple.
“Gordon is so motivated. He’ll go out and have five or six winners one day, but 10 minutes later it’s all forgotten about and his focus is solely on tomorrow and the next days coming up. He’s extremely determined to keep improving year on year.
“Both Gordon and Jack [Kennedy] are on fire at the minute and having great seasons. You’d imagine they’re just betting on Jack now to stay in one piece. We really hope he will. He’s been very unlucky in recent years and probably deserves [a jockeys’ title] after five broken legs. If he keeps riding a few winners every week, he’ll be hard caught, I think.”
Moran adds: “We have three horses with Olly Murphy in the UK too, and he obviously spent time with Gordon before going out on his own in Britain where he’s had success. It was nice to see Castle Ivers win for us a couple of weeks ago on his first start for us in a bumper with Olly. Hopefully he might be our best one with him.”
BHA restriction
Elliott has been the central figure mentioned in discussions surrounding the British Horseracing Authority’s consideration of a cap on trainers running any more than four horses in major handicaps. Moran has serious questions over the merits of such a move.
“It is concerning to see where this ends up,” he says.
“Again, there are two sides to it and if you’re a small trainer with four or five horses, trying to get one of them into a handicap, you can understand where they are coming from. At the same time, if you’re a bigger trainer with eight or 10 different horses wanting to run for different owners, what are you going to do? Are you going to have to ring the owner and say ‘I can’t enter your horse’?
“I’m not sure a move like this would improve the sport. In fairness, the bigger trainers are running the horses who are higher rated. What you’re really doing is pulling out higher rated horses to let worse ones run. Is that going to improve the sport? Do they have a chance if they get in anyway? It’s hard to know. I wouldn’t like to see it coming into Ireland anyway. I hope not.
“If Willie [Mullins] and Gordon aren’t running their horses, do we end up with big handicaps that only have five or six runners? What use is that for sport or sponsors? It’s no use having small fields. I know some gave out about the number of runners Gordon had in the Troytown, but if he hadn’t, what would have been in it? It wouldn’t have been much of a €100,000 handicap.
“Whether you’re an owner, sponsor or racegoer, you want to see the best horses running in the best races. In most cases, the best horses are the highest-rated ones. Those are the horses who should be running. The Grand National field is already reduced, and now it could be squeezed. Something has to give eventually. I’m not sure this is for the benefit of the sport.”
Firefox runs in the Grade 1 Lawlor's Of Naas Novice Hurdle \ Healy Racing
Festival dreams
Moran, whose company eCOMM Merchant Solutions recently partnered with HRI as payment provider to its four racecourses, has never made any secret of the fact a winner at the Cheltenham Festival is his ultimate ambition. The ball just hasn’t quite bounced his way thus far at the Cotswolds highlight.
Queens Brook posted a second and two thirds from her trio of Grade 1 attempts at the meeting, American Mike was runner-up to Facile Vega in a Champion Bumper, The Bosses Oscar and Petit Mouchoir each found only one too good in the Pertemps Final and County Hurdle respectively, while Zanahiyr finished third past the post in a pair of Champion Hurdles.
Throw in further placed efforts with Hollow Games (third in Martin Pipe) and Fakir D’alene (fourth in Kim Muir), as well as the ill-fated Ginto suffering a fatal injury in the Albert Bartlett when travelling with ease, and the Morans undoubtedly deserve a change of luck at the biggest meeting of them all.
“That was a bad day with Ginto, and when you don’t have many top-class horses, you feel it,” says Moran.“Others might have seven or eight top horses - and nobody wants to lose any of them - but Ginto was our only Grade 1 winner at that time. It’s a downside of the sport but you have to keep moving forward. If you’re not able to take the rough with the smooth, you get used to it very quickly. You need to, it’s as simple as that. The more bad days you have, the more appreciative you are when things go right.”
On his ambitions for a first Cheltenham triumph in March, Moran quips: “Sure it’s the biggest Irish racing festival of the year, isn’t it? Everyone wants a runner there for starters and a winner is the holy grail. We’ll try to get as many there as we can again this March. We haven’t got our head in front yet but hopefully it’s just a matter of time.”
Could Firefox be his best chance of a winner this spring?
“I suppose you’d have to say that, especially with the way he beat Ballyburn last time,” he says. “I know it was Ballyburn’s first run of the season – and he obviously improved a lot from it – but it wasn’t a negative anyway to see him come out and win by 25 lengths at Leopardstown over Christmas. Hopefully he is as good as that. The Lawlor’s will be a step up this weekend and I’d imagine the quality of the field will be stronger on the whole. Hopefully he can step up, it won’t be easy. We should know what we have after Sunday.”
After being made to wait between drinks, Grade 1 wins could be set to arrive like buses for Bective this winter. A fruitful festive period materialising into a spring of Cheltenham success would be no less than the Morans deserve.
There could hardly be a sweeter reward for their patience.
American Mike
He was a bit disappointing at Limerick over Christmas. He looked to be travelling very well to the third last but just didn’t find. He was very good on his first start over fences at Navan so maybe it was just too heavy for him last time at Limerick.
Firefox
He did it well at Fairyhouse but it’s going to be a hot race this weekend at Naas. With Croke Park in the line-up too, it’s hard to know whether he’s even the best of Gordon’s runners in the race because Croke Park is a smart horse too. It’s positive that Jack has picked Firefox.
Found A Fifty
We were delighted with him at Leopardstown. It was only his third run over fences and I think he’s improving with every run. We met a better stayer in the Drinmore, an Irish National winner, but he’s come on from that. We haven’t discussed with Gordon what could be next but I’d imagine he will run before Cheltenham.
My Trump Card
I think he came up against a smart horse [in I Will Be Baie] at Fairyhouse on New Year’s Day - they pulled a long way clear of the third and the rest of the field. I don’t think he lost anything in defeat in heavy, testing conditions. He’s still only a young horse with plenty of scope.
The Yellow Clay
Our first homebred winner. Unfortunately he got a bit of a setback and hasn’t been out yet this season but hopefully he’ll go for another bumper in the coming weeks, potentially at the Dublin Racing Festival.
Wingmen
He looked good when winning on his first start for us in a bumper at Naas last month. Hopefully he’ll go to the Dublin Racing Festival next for another bumper.
Zanahiyr
It was a decent run from him on his first start over fences at Leopardstown against a very good horse [Fact To File]. There looks to be a chase in him so we’ll probably keep him over fences and he’ll go for another beginners’ chase.