We have been here before.
Like in 2017, in the dying embers of the 2016/17 season, ignited by the competition between Willie Mullins and Gordon Elliott for the Irish National Hunt trainers’ championship.
It was a thread that had run through the entirety of the season that year. Gordon Elliott held a significant lead before the Punchestown Festival got under way, and the bookmakers made him favourite to win the title for the first time.
Then Punchestown.
On the Tuesday, the first day of the 2017 Punchestown Festival, the Willie Mullins-trained duo Cilaos Emery and Melon finished first and second respectively in the Grade 1 Champion Novice Hurdle. On Wednesday, Gordon Elliott won two of the three Grade 1 races with Champagne Classic and Fayonagh. On Wednesday evening, the bookmakers still made Elliott odds-on to win the title.
On Thursday, Willie Mullins won the Grade 1 Ryanair Novice Chase with Great Field and the mares’ novice hurdle with Asthuria, but he was still a shade of odds-against on Thursday evening. Just two days to go in the season. Then on Friday, he won three races, including two of the Grade 1s, while Gordon Elliott won one. Mullins hit the front in the championship and went odds-on, with one day to go.
Elliott rallied on Saturday, the final day of the season. He won the Grade 1 Mares’ Champion Hurdle with Apple’s Jade but, 35 minutes later, Mullins won the Champion Four-Year-Olds’ Hurdle with Bapaume, and the title was his, a 10th in a row, an 11th in total.
The end of the 2017/18 was not too dissimilar, only it was even more dramatic. The season had followed a similar pattern, Elliott out in front, bagged the Kerry National and the Champion Chase at Down Royal and the Troytown Chase and the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle and the Dinmore Chase and the Royal Bond Hurdle. When the Gordon Elliott-trained General Principle got home by a head from the Willie Mullins-trained Isleofhopendreams in the 2018 Irish Grand National, it represented a swing of €350,000 in favour of Elliott. Going into the 2018 Punchestown Festival, he was €521,413 in front.
Mullins started early at the 2018 Punchestown Festival, he won the Champion Novice Hurdle with Draconien on the first day and he had the 1-2 in the Champion Chase with Un De Sceaux and Douvan. That narrowed the gap to €226,714. Then Gordon Elliott had the 1-2-3 in the Goffs Land Rover Bumper, led home by Commander Of Fleet.
Then the Growise Champion Novice Chase (full replay below).
The drama of the race was only heightened by the trainers’ championship undercurrent. The Willie Mullis-trained Al Boum Photo running out at the final fence, taking Finian’s Oscar with him, and leaving the path clear for a Gordon Elliott-trained 1-2-3, led by The Storyteller.
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If Al Boum Photo had won that race, he would have bagged €59,000 for Mullins, and, if Finian’s Oscar had finished second, Gordon Elliott would have netted just €15,000 for having the third, fourth and fifth. Fourth-placed Rathvinden (Mullins) would have finished sixth and fifth-placed Shattered Love (Elliott) would have finished seventh.
Lots of ifs and buts in there, but still, it is not unreasonable to assume that the incident effected a difference of plus €74,000 for Elliott and minus €56,000 for Mullins, so a total swing of €130,000. That left Elliott €405,839 in front on Tuesday evening, four days to go in the season, and still favourite.
Then on Wednesday, Willie Mullins cut loose. Incredibly, he trained six of the seven winners on the second day of the 2018 Punchestown Festival. He had the 1-2 in the Punchestown Gold Cup and the 1-2-3 in the Champion Bumper. On Wednesday evening, he was €48,161 in front, on Thursday evening he was €424,148 in front, and he had another title in the bag.
Willie Mullins has been champion 18 times in a row now and 19 times in total. It’s an incredible record. And yet, there was a time when it looked like he would never able to beat Noel Meade. Just like there was a time when it was difficult to imagine Willie Mullins’ own dominance ever being threatened. Then in 2016/17 Gordon Elliott made the leap from young, upwardly mobile trainer to genuine title contender.
The total amount of prize money that Gordon Elliott amassed in 2017/18 would have been enough to win any other championship that had gone before. It was just that, that year, Willie Mullins accumulated more. Both trainers went well through the 200-winner mark and the €5 million mark, and that was remarkable.
That’s a feature of this rivalry. Both trainers pushing through boundaries, reaching new heights, the impetus for one derived from the challenge presented by the other.
It has been thus for years. Gordon Elliott has been runner-up 13 times now.
This season, it’s as you were: Elliott out in front, Mullins stalking in behind as we close in on the Irish Grand National and then move on to Punchestown.
Gordon Elliott has bagged some of the most valuable prizes in Ireland this season to date. He completed the Galway Plate/Galway Hurdle double during the summer with Western Fold and Ndaawi, and he completed the Royal Bond Hurdle/Drinmore Chase/Hatton’s Grace Hurdle treble at Fairyhouse in November.
He won the Christmas Hurdle with Teahupoo and the Irish Arkle with Romeo Coolio and the Irish Champion Hurdle with Brighterdaysahead, and he had the 1-2 in the valuable Paddy Power Chase with Favori De Champdou and Search For Glory. He also won the American Grand National Hurdle at Far Hills in October with Zanahiyr, worth a multiple of the value of most Irish National Hunt races, but that doesn't count in the Irish trainers’ championship.
Willie Mullins won the Morgiana Hurdle and the December Festival Hurdle with Lossiemouth, and he had the 1-2 in the John Durkan Chase with Gaelic Warrior and Fact To File, and he won five Grade 1 races at the Dublin Racing Festival. He also won eight races at Cheltenham, including the Gold Cup and the Champion Hurdle and the Champion Chase, and he won the Ebor and the Breeders’ Cup Turf with Ethical Diamond but, as above, none of that counts in the Irish National Hunt trainers’ championship.
As things stand, Gordon Elliott has a lead of almost €400,000. He says that he has no chance, but he does. The bookmakers say 1/5 Mullins, 3/1 Elliott.
The valuable prizes, the pivotal contests between now and the end of the season are obviously at Fairyhouse and Punchestown. The Irish Grand National has a total prize fund of €500,000, with €269,500 going to the winner. It looks like Mullins’ main contenders will be Argento Boy, the progressive novice who stays well, and Kiss Will, another unexposed novice who won a listed novices’ hurdle over three miles.
Elliott could run half a dozen, headed up by Better Days Ahead, sixth last year but a year older and a year stronger and primed for the race this year, and Search For Glory, who could have won the Ultima at Cheltenham had he not unseated at the last.
And Punchestown is obviously going to be pivotal again, with 12 Grade 1 races and €3.6 million in prize money up for grabs. This thread could run all the way to the end again.
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