Perseverance got its reward at Cheltenham on Thursday when Home By The Lee made it fifth-time lucky to become the oldest ever winner of the Paddy Power Stayers’ Hurdle.
Joseph O’Brien’s veteran had had little luck in the Stayers’ championship over the years with previous form figures of U356 in the race. His best shot looked to have been in 2023 when a bad blunder early in the race ruined his chance.
A 33-1 SP reflected widespread belief that his opportunity had been and gone. But no one told Home By The Lee.
Tackling his fellow veteran Hewick coming down the hill, he looked wide open to a finishing thrust, most obviously from the cruising English star Kabral Du Mathan, who headed him at the last. Ultimately, though, he was powerless to resist the rallying Irish stalwart.
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As Kabral faded, Ballyburn got closest despite a less than clear passage, while last year’s winner Bob Olinger was third. The 2024 winner and 9-4 favourite Teahupoo was a disappointing sixth.
Even for O’Brien, who has trained and ridden Classic winners, as well a pair of Melbourne Cup champions, it was a sweet success for a horse winning his 12th race in all. All but three of them have come with the trainer’s cousin JJ Slevin on board.
“Of all the horses I’ve ever trained he’s the winning-most in number of wins,” said O’Brien. “We’ve had him since he just turned four, so he’s been there a long time. He trains every day with enthusiasm and when he’s off, he gets bored. He loves his work, loves his job, loves his racing and has never had a lame step in his life. He’s a superstar.”
It was Slevin’s fourth winner at a festival where he’s endured some bitter fortune, including being unseated from Fastorlsow in the 2024 Gold Cup.
“When he was travelling so well, I thought I’d press on. Then down to the last he started looking around and I thought, ‘Oh no, we’re in a bit of bother’. Harry [Skelton on Kabral Du Mathan] went a good half-length up on me [but] he put down his head and away he went again,” he said.
Just before the Stayers there were groans around Cheltenham when it was announced the day’s headline act, Fact To File, had been taken out of the Ryanair Chase due to ground conditions being too quick.
Willie Mullins and JP McManus had waited for rain but not enough of it came. So, the horse that wasn’t supplemented into the Gold Cup – ironically with overnight rain forecast – couldn’t line up for the supposed ‘penalty kick’ the Ryanair represented.
Both Mullins and McManus were pointedly critical of the Cheltenham authorities for not putting more water on the New course.
The sport’s biggest owner said there was little point doing a good job on 90 per cent of the track but leaving 10 per cent. “I walk the track every day and they’ve done a great job in a lot of ways, but I think they could’ve done more,” McManus said.
“These horses are too difficult to get and to acquire. When you have them, you mind them,” Mullins commented after the decision was made. “You want to have the top horses at the best festival, but if the ground is like this, we are not going to bring them.”
All of it suggested that McManus’s second-string Jonbon might finally get his day in the festival spotlight, but for a fourth time he was runner-up. Heart Wood found Fact To File too good a year previously and made the most of his old rival’s absence to win by 10 lengths.
“With the favourite out, I thought that if he put in the same performance [as last year] – and he seemed to be better this year – that he could be bang there,” said jockey Darragh O’Keeffe after supplying Henry de Bromhead with a 26th festival success.
Heart Wood broke his Grade One duck and so did the remarkable Wodhooh in the Close Bros Mares’ Hurdle to get Gordon Elliott and Jack Kennedy off the mark for the week. Beaten just once in 11 starts over flights – by Lossiemouth at Aintree last year – the odds-on favourite had a length in hand of Jade De Grugy at the line.
Irish horses pulled off the Grade One trio but day three ended with British horses edging it four wins to three. The overall tally going into the final day is 11-10 to the visitors.
