How did you get involved in racing?

In 1992, a great friend of ours, Janet Murray, bought us a mare called Dear Lorraine. We started to breed from her, and the first racehorse that we bred was Catch The Blues. We were buying The Irish Field every week, mostly for sport horses, but I noticed a young trainer called Aidan O’Brien was doing very well, so we sent Catch The Blues to him and she turned out to be a superb racehorse. She won the Ballyogan Stakes and placed twice at Royal Ascot. Aidan trained three horses for us and they all won. For the final year or two of Catch The Blues’ career, she was trained in Ballydoyle until it became exclusively for Coolmore and John Magnier, so we moved to John Oxx.

We only stopped breeding horses a few years ago. We were almost always on the flat until five or six years ago, when we had a horse with John who didn’t perform, so we sent it to Gavin Cromwell. She wasn’t much good but Gavin tried his best to get her to win. We have a horse called Blues Emperor with Johnny Murtagh as well, he went back into training about a month ago.

Gavin bought Vanillier for us at one of the select sales. I had seen his point-to-point run a few weeks before and I was quite impressed. At the end of the day, I left it to Gavin to pick whatever horse he thought was suitable, and it turns out that he made a very good choice.

Not only did we see that Aidan O’Brien was a coming force back 30 years ago, but when we saw Gavin making headway when he started training, it was through The Irish Field articles as well.

We sent all of our horses to Janet’s husband Mark for pre-training and breaking, and they would have started their education on the Dreaper’s gallops. He’s a brilliant man to break in horses and to introduce them to racing. It just so happens that his father was head lad to Tom Dreaper in the days of Arkle. I love that connection, these are real horsemen, you’re only as good as the people around you. For the horses that’s the trainer and the people around them that produce the goods in the end.

Have you bred any nice horses over the years?

Geological was the first horse out of Bean Uasal, who is out of Catch The Blues. He won 17 races, an absolute legend and a superb racehorse. Out of that family, Blues Emperor has come close to him in terms of performance, except that Bean Uasal’s full-sister, Dream The Blues, who we sold as a yearling, bred Sioux Nation.

Tell me about your Grand National hope, Vanillier.

When he started his chasing career, he didn’t jump great, but he had kissing spine so he had to have an operation. That held him back in his novice year and then he was second in the Grand National in 2023 before having a serious foot operation. He’s a spring horse and he’s very hard to get the weight off, so Gavin’s team couldn’t get him fit enough for the Grand National last year.

This year, being 100% sound, it’s taken him an awful lot of time to get fit enough. Another thing they had to do, which is the great thing about Gavin and his team and particularly Keith Donoghue, they had to get his mojo back which is why they decided to go for the Cross Country at Cheltenham. They even brought him hunting.

Gavin and Keith have worked really hard to get Vanillier to love racing again and that’s been the big turnaround. It’s a fantastic achievement that they’ve managed to do that, nothing short of spectacular. They’re just pure horsemen.

Becky Rafter looks after him and she’s absolutely mad about him. She does a fantastic job. She says sometimes that he’s not the most friendly and doesn’t take to everybody but she gets on great with him.

What did you make of his run at Cheltenham?

After the mishap, which Sean [Flanagan] was very apologetic about, I didn’t think he had any hope, but he got back into a good position. I think he made one mistake and fell back a little, and we were cheering for Keith then, but when he stayed on in the last furlong it was brilliant. Stamina is his strength. Whether he would have beaten Stumptown, I don’t know, but if he has a bit of luck in Aintree he could be there at the finish. I would hope that there’s a bit of a dig in the ground at Aintree, so we’re hopeful of that. When he ran in Cheltenham in the middle of December under Johnny Burke, he led for 25 of the 30 fences and he wouldn’t have been fit enough to do himself justice, but he was enjoying himself and that was the important thing.

Have you noticed any issues that owners are facing?

No, I haven’t, we’ve always gone with the flow. Occasionally you’d have a few words to say about the handicapper in certain instances! What’s quite remarkable, is that it appears that the Irish handicapper doesn’t handicap the cross country races. That was a worry to us because Vanillier was on a mark of 144 and if it was last year he wouldn’t have gotten into the Grand National which was a worry for us this year.

The British handicapper does his own handicapping for the National and he put him up to 147. I don’t know what the lowest mark to get in will be but I think it was 146 last year. It’s just the prerogative of the Irish handicapper not to change them and I have no criticism there, but thank God the British handicapper did or he wouldn’t have a chance of getting in!

I’m sure you’re looking forward to heading over to Aintree?

We can’t wait. We can’t believe that we’re in the position we are now. If you had asked us a few months ago we were thinking we’d seen the best of him but he’s had a remarkable turnaround. I think the cross country has been a massive help to him. He’s a 10-year-old now, and I think for the Grand National that shouldn’t matter too much. For him to be now one of the favourites is remarkable but it’s all down to Gavin and the team.

I can’t get over the atmosphere. You’re so privileged to be standing in the parade ring. It’s hard to describe, it’s an unreal situation. You’re pinching yourself wondering if you should be there, and nervous as hell! The hurdles I can handle a little bit, but the chasing is nerve-racking. I don’t think that my wife Helen gets as nervous as I do. She loves racing, but she loves the horses for themselves. When Vanillier comes home, she feeds him carrots every day. He’s been a godsend to us. If it wasn’t for the fact that we had a horse who wasn’t performing on the flat and decided to have a go at the jumps, we wouldn’t be in this position.