YOU’D have excused Martin Brassil for feeling a little down on himself after the Cheltenham Festival. He cracked the crossbar when Fastorslow found only the subsequent Grand National winner Corach Rambler too good in the Ultima, and he found the inside of the post when An Epic Song was just outdone by Langer Dan in the Coral.
However those close misses probably made it all the more sweeter when he launched a 25-yarder into the top corner when Fastorslow came back to upset the Gold Cup one-two in the Punchestown equivalent.
Brassil is a fine example of the talent so evident in the so called smaller stables in this country. A Grand National and Cheltenham Festival-winning trainer, he has handled Fastorslow brilliantly. Needless to say, the Sean and Bernardine Mulryan-owned horse had a tricky profile when he arrived in Ireland, having got rid of both his hurdles and chase novice status by winning earlier in France, but Brassil still came close to extracting a Cheltenham Festival win out of him twice (beaten a short head in last year’s Coral Cup), bringing him along slowly and readying him for one big day.
His victory at Punchestown was testament to that patience and the horse has since proved there was no fluke about it by securing his trainer a fourth career Grade 1 by taking the John Durkan Chase back at Punchestown, a race he was well held in 12 months previously.
Brassil made his name as a trainer when Numbersixvalverde won the Grand National in 2006 and he scooped another National success when his Desertmore House got in from the reserves to take the Kerry National at Listowel in September, in the same colours of Bernard Carroll. If his trainer thinks he has another National horse on his hands in this seven-year-old, he will be of significant interest next April and more immediately in the Paddy Power Chase on Wednesday.
McConnell
John McConnell could also have a live chance in the National with his Coral Gold Cup runner-up Mahler Mission. He ran a fine race at Newbury and has a lovely unexposed staying chaser profile still.
When he came down at the second last in the National Hunt Chase, his trainer cursed his luck and immediately thought that a Cheltenham Festival winner was beyond him, before returning just two days later to send out Seddon to win the Magners Plate, under an excellent ride from the up and coming Ben Harvey.
McConnell would go on to score at both the Aintree and Punchestown Festivals, capping off a fine season in which his 30 winners at home was near double his best ever tally. The Co Meath-based trainer has a team of 100 horses and is hungry for further success. Despite a recent poor run of form, it has been a really good year for him.
It was another good year for Emmet Mullins who did a really Emmet Mullins-type thing when he sent out Feronily to win the Grade 1 Dooley Insurance Group Champion Novice Chase on just his second start over fences at Punchestown. It was a first top level win for the trainer and jockey Donagh Meyler. Mullins and his close ally Paul Byrne are now well known as a really shrewd outfit, and they demonstrated that yet again when Slate Lane took the Betfair Stayers’ Handicap Hurdle at Haydock, again with Meyler in the plate.
PAUL Townend didn’t realise it at the time, but when he drove out Impaire Et Passe to a thoroughly impressive win in the Ballymore Novice Hurdle, it was his 100th Grade 1 win for Willie Mullins.
That’s fair going when you consider he had only had the number one job at Closutton for just over three and a half seasons. He had 22 Grade 1 wins in all last season which is a new best tally but it wasn’t all smooth sailing, with Willie Mullins very publicly criticising a couple of his rides at the Dublin Racing Festival, which went some way to shining a light on the constant pressure Townend must feel to perform to his very best.
Such pressure can often bring out the best in sports people and the Cork rider showed all his class and more at the latter spring festivals, most notably on Galopin Des Champs in the Gold Cup and a truly remarkable effort on I Am Maximus to win the Irish Grand National.
The first ride was all finesse, an effort that maximised his horse’s opportunity to show all his class on the biggest stage, while the second effort was sensational use of horsemanship, strength and creative thinking to get himself off the mark in the Fairyhouse feature.
Townend won his fifth Irish jockeys’ championship at Punchestown but it looks like he will have a tougher fight on his hands this term with Jack Kennedy setting a relentless pace thus far. The Kerry native has had rotten luck with injuries but if he can stay fit, it will be very interesting in the spring.
LIAM Burke hit the national headlines when he rode Teuchters Glory to win a Limerick bumper at the grand old age of 66.
The Thyestes Chase and Galway Plate-winning trainer, father of the prominent Britain-based rider Jonathan, defied his own age and two replaced knees to remarkably bridge a gap of 34 years from his last winner.
Afterward he said: “Everyone thinks I’m mad, but I think you have to be mad in this game!”
You’d wonder if such an achievement might prove an inspiration to Patrick Mullins, who at half Burke’s age, rode his 800th winner at Listowel in September. The 15-time champion amatuer now rightfully has hit sights set on 1,000 wins which would be a fabulous landmark to reach.
