Ballyburn is clear over the last at Cheltenham

Is Ballyburn the next Big Buck's? | Hatton's Grace Hurdle

By Nic Doggett

Horse Racing

Sun November 30, 2025 · 2M ago

Nic Doggett leans on Willie Mullins' stable tour as he looks ahead to Ballyburn's return to hurdling in Sunday's Grade 1 Hatton's Grace Hurdle at Fairyhouse.

Chasing last year really didn’t suit him and, in my mind, we’ll go down the Stayers’ Hurdle route this time.

Okay. Grand.

He’ll probably start off in the Hatton’s Grace but if I could find another race not to take on Lossiemouth I would.

Job done (x2).

Then there’s a nice race at Leopardstown over Christmas and that’s where we’ll go while looking at the English calendar as well. Whether he gets another race between then and Cheltenham? Probably not I’d say and then hopefully he can pitch up there in good order and jump his hurdles better than he did his fences.

Good plan and wouldn’t be overly hard given he jumped them like me (19 stone with a hint of middle-aged spread).

He galloped and attacked his hurdles as a novice. I’m not sure he had much respect for them but he kicked them out of the way and is very hardy. It didn’t work over fences for him, and this is the obvious route for him now.

Ah, yes. The obvious route.

Which is the Stayers’ Hurdle? Isn’t it? Like, definitely?

Sunday’s Hatton’s Grace Hurdle is often something of a curate’s egg when it comes to looking at future Festival targets, with the assumption often made that horses running over two and a half miles in winter will relish three miles in the spring.

But is that necessarily going to be the case for Ballyburn?

Patrick Mullins thinks his best trip is going to be two and a half miles, and you don’t have to remember too far back to the impression that Ballyburn made when translating his novice/maiden hurdle form into the two-mile Grade 1 at Leopardstown in February 2024.

Obviously, since then, he has mainly raced between two and a half and three miles, but let’s not forget that connections felt he was quick enough to take on Sir Gino over two miles in the Wayward Lad at Kempton last Christmas, for all that was before his jumping frailties came to the fore.

“Is he the next Big Buck’s?” was the question posed to me by Ben Linfoot.

It's a similar path, but I think Big Buck’s was a bit of a late-developing freak as he already had 13 runs (with only two wins) under his belt in France before joining Paul Nicholls.

He may have won a Grade 2 over fences, but he was only rated 153 when unseating in the Hennessy – his final chase start – and he made quite staggering progress over hurdles thereafter, winning a Cheltenham handicap off 151 and – 17 wins later – was rated a whopping 23lb higher on 174.

Ballyburn returns in triumph

These are different times, but Ballyburn is already rated 162 on this return to hurdles (3lb higher than his chase rating). If he were to improve by 23lb over the next couple of seasons, then he would be the best we’ve ever seen.

But that is impossible.

Night Nurse had Sea Pigeon and Monksfield to elevate his performances, Istabraq - who was turned over at 1/7 in the Hatton's Grace once upon a time - had Limestone Lad and Moscow Flyer, while Comedy Of Errors had Bula, Lanzarote and co; Ballyburn’s only chance for the modern day version of greatness is if connections decide to roll the dice and campaign him over two miles after Sunday.

After all, assuming Saturday’s Fighting Fifth sees a performance of note from Constitution Hill, his peak rating of 175 is a good benchmark for Ballyburn to aim for and, with due respect to Sunday's rival Teahupoo, that just isn’t going to happen in a race like the Stayers’ Hurdle.

Winners of the Hatton’s Grace – which was named after a three-time Champion Hurdle winner, after all - who went on to contest the two-mile showpiece have a record of 2-1-1-6-1-1, the most recent being the mare Honeysuckle in 2022 (she was also third in the Hatton’s Grace when winning the Champion Hurdle the following year).

Lossiemouth could have followed in her footsteps last season. I would really like Ballyburn to try in this one, whether his stablemates are there or not. Who knows after Saturday's Fighting Fifth drama?

I'm hoping that Sunday's first step into the season might well begin the debates about his Festival destination, rather than end them before they've even started, though more realistically I think races like the Aintree Hurdle may be the best fit further down the line.

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