CHELTENHAM FESTIVAL DAY ONE REPORT:IT TOOK a Champion Hurdle success by her stable companion Hurricane Fly to knock Quevega off yesterday's top festival headline but Willie Mullins's remarkable mare still managed to secure her own piece of Cheltenham history with a third David Nicholson Mares' Hurdle triumph in a row.
Once again Quevega looked in a different class to her rivals and the bad news for the owner of every other mare in these islands is that yesterday’s success looked the easiest of her hat-trick so far.
Ruby Walsh had an armchair ride throughout and could afford to look around from the turn in as the 5 to 6 favourite swept 10 lengths clear of her market rival Sparky May.
“She has so much class and she settles so much better now. She just lobs away, a perfect ride. She’s a remarkable mare,” the jockey reported to Mullins who indicated that Quevega will be back to attempt a festival four-in-a-row next year.
“The owners are racing people rather then breeders and I imagine she will come back,” he said. “It was extraordinary how easily she won. She’s a superstar. I thought she might have been short of a gallop today but maybe I had her over the top for the last couple of years!”
That put the seal on a great day for the raiders as Sizing Australia headed an Irish one-two-three in the Cross-Country Chase under an inspired Andrew Lynch ride from the front. “He was hampered last year and finished down the field but we didn’t make enough use of him and it was my fault,” said trainer Henry De Bromhead who saddles Sizing Europe in today’s Champion Chase.
“I told Andrew to ride him how he wanted today and it just shows you should leave it up to the jockeys.”
Lynch reported: “They have to adapt to the jumps and it doesn’t suit every type of horse but it suits our lad really well. And Henry’s horses are just coming into form in the past couple of weeks.”
The veteran former duel-winner Garde Champetre made a gallant attempt to overhaul the winner and his trainer Enda Bolger said: “He’s run his heart out and there appears to be plenty of life left in him yet.”
Ruby Walsh’s famous hat-trick was kicked off by Al Ferof’s late swoop in the Supreme that saw the Paul Nicholls-trained grey overhaul the Nicky Henderson pair, Spirit Son and Sprinter Sacre. The heavily-backed favourite Cue Card was fourth.
“I went for Al Ferof over Zaidpour (seventh) but you get some right and you get some wrong,” said Walsh who also won the Supreme in the same colours on Noland some years ago.
“It takes the pressure off to start like that and for Ruby to do that, it was the best thing that could have happened,” Nicholls said. “This is the first time I’ve had the horse right. He looked amazing today and it was a brilliant ride.”
Walsh’s great friend and rival Barry Geraghty endured a frustrating day, finishing runner-up on Spirit Son, and filled the same spot in the Arkle and the Stewart Family Handicap Chase. For good measure he was third in the Champion Hurdle on Oscar Whiskey.
It was Captain Chris that got the better of Finian’s Rainbow in the Arkle, staying on the better up the hill to justify Philip Hobbs’s late decision to switch from the two-and-a-half-mile Jewson.
“I still think he needs two and a half but they say you need a horse that stays to win the Arkle. He proves the point,” the Somerset trainer said.
“My first thought is that the King George, going right-handed over three miles would be just the job for him.”
Geraghty’s day didn’t get any better when he got a one-day whip ban on Carole’s Legacy who was just edged out in an exciting finish to the handicap chase by Bensalem.
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