Galway and a touch of magic

RACING: Brian O'Connor talks to trainer Chisty Roche about Galway's special appeal and about his two well-fancied runners for Thursday's Galway hurdle

The build-up is over and so the question that has been asked again and again over the past week can be tucked away for another year.

Why the Galway festival should be so successful continues to defy logical analysis, so why bother asking.

Almost 200,000 will pile past the turnstiles during the week and the reasons for being there are so varied there is no point reaching for that sociology degree.

Thousands of once-a-year punters, who normally wouldn't know a hurdle from a fence, simply choose to get their equine kick in Ballybrit rather than the Curragh.

The purists may despair, but then they breathe a more rarefied air than the roguish and burger-singed oxygen on offer this week.

"It's a huge buzz considering some of the racing. Apart from the Plate and the Hurdle, the horses aren't great. But I suppose the horses are in second place aren't they?"

Christy Roche grins when he says that and the grin throws more light on the Galway phenomenon than any amount of pseudo-analysis could.

As a champion jockey and then a top trainer, the little man's grins, grimaces and occasional frowns have sent ripples through the betting rings of the country for over 30 years.

Derby winners may have been ridden and Cheltenham hot-pots prepared. But that shrewd face looks like it gets a kick out of a good touch that the rest of us can understand only too well.

The kind of touch that Galway is synonymous with, and the kind that gets bums on seats so they can say they were there when it happened.

Last year they could say they were there to see Grimes do what the formbook indicated he would do and win the Plate. For once the formbook was right.

Roche hung back and let the national press pack descend on JP McManus in the winners' enclosure, happy that his job was done. This time he has to try and do the same with another McManus-owned hope, Risk Accessor.

As if that's not enough, Timber King has been at the top of the ante-post market for Thursday's Hurdle ever since betting started.

It is an enviable big-race hand and no one will relish it more, even if Roche maintains that the Galway spice of legend is a thing of the past.

"It's not like the old days anymore. Planning a touch for Galway used to go on for ages, but it's not as easy to do now. For one thing, you're not guaranteed a run because it's so easy to be balloted out and the prizemoney everywhere is so fantastic now anyway," he says.

Certainly nothing like 1975 when Dunstan started a well-backed favourite for the McDonogh Handicap and won under the rising young riding star.

"I always felt Galway was a jockey's track because you have to know what's going on around you every second. At that time we used to jump out, cut across and try to take out the dangers. But the racing is much straighter now with all the cameras around.

"The track itself is not that hard to ride. It's just that it is always so competitive at Galway and the number of runners is always big.

"The one thing about it was that it was the one place in Ireland where the jockeys liked to be the leading rider at the meeting. Normally that kind of thing didn't matter, but with Galway there was always a bit more of a buzz in the jockeys' room," he says.

As a trainer, Roche has focused more of his considerable stable strength on Galway in recent years. A total of four winners last year equalled the take in 2000 when the then little-known Bannow Bay won two hurdle races.

"If we get four again it will be a bit of a miracle. I might have about 10 runners all week, but we have chances in the big races and I'd like to think we might have three winners," he says.

Risk Accessor has been near the head of the Plate betting since it started, but last season's high-class novice doesn't appear to carry quite the same confidence behind him as Grimes did.

"JP is of the opinion that Risk Accessor is not well handicapped and he has the habit of being right. It was JP very early in the day who copped that Grimes was well in last year and he thinks this horse has too much weight for a novice.

"Risk Accessor has also given the impression of there being a kink in his temperament when it comes to a battle. I think, though, that has mostly happened on soft ground so we'll hope for better going on Wednesday," he says.

There is more apparent confidence in Timber King's shout for Thursday's big race after his recent victory at Tipperary when carrying the McManus colours for the first time.

"He is a horse who has every pound of weight he should have. There's no hidden agenda with him. There is often one in that race that is well handicapped and if there is one this time, it will beat him. But nothing jumps out at the moment," says Roche.

The Curragh-based trainer's list of victories were added to at the Cheltenham holy grail in March courtesy of Like-A-Butterfly. However, the significance of success at Galway is not lost on him.

"If you win the Plate or the Hurdle, there's no doubt you're a long way in front for the season," he says. "When Grimes won the Plate it was a fantastic day, for everyone. We're just hoping the same might happen again."

A helluva lot of people in the stands will be hoping for the same thing. The bookies probably won't. The annual Galway magic in a nutshell.