Mike Cattermole on Our Duke, Yorkhill and more


Top broadcaster Mike Cattermole discusses Our Duke, Yorkhill and more in his latest column.

Good Friday was good

The fourth AW Championships Finals Day went down very well in front of a record crowd of 10,817 at Lingfield last Friday.

Up on the terrace looking down from the head-on stand, as part of the ATR team I was drawn next to Alex Hammond which doesn’t get much better as far as good draws go at Lingfield. After Forceful Appeal inched out War Glory in the opener, the day just flew by.

With £1m in prize money, it was great to get the quality fields and there were some high-class winners among them, no doubt about that. None more so perhaps than Convey, decisive winner of the Easter Classic and Second Thought, who got a great ride from Robert Winston to take the 3-y-o Conditions Stakes.

Now that the fixture is getting established, it can only be a matter of time before these contests get due recognition from the Pattern Race Committee with the above two races probably worth Group Three and Listed tags respectively.

One regret was the lack of Irish-trained runners – just one from Darren Bunyan in the opening handicap - although there were four French challengers and that is to be encouraged. It is an easy commute, after all.

At least the Good Friday fare gets the Easter weekend off to a great start. Perhaps because of all the publicity, Easter Saturday tends to get overlooked and is rather lost. And at this time of the year, it is all rather muddled with jumping at Haydock (excellent card with £315,000 in prize money), as well as on the Flat at both Musselburgh and Kempton.

At one time, Kempton’s card contained both the Easter Stakes and Masaka Stakes, which in the past might have offered up one or two outsiders for the Classics. These races, which had Listed status in times gone by, have long lost their identity which seems a shame. On Saturday, they were run as the Over 2,800 Flat Races On Racing UK Conditions Stakes and the Watch Racing UK On Virgin 536 Fillies’ Conditions Stakes.

That said, both were won by nice types. It was good to see again the famous McAlpine colours (Circus Plume etc) of Nigel and Carolyn Elwes, whose home-bred Sibilance won the fillies’ race for Ralph Beckett. 

However, the best time of the three races over a mile on the card was recorded by Kafoo Shememi, who took the colts and geldings race in style. Richard Hannon’s colt is not entered in the Guineas but has been working with the yard’s Guineas colts. 

This has to be a very encouraging sign indeed for Team Hannon whose Classic team line-up will be looking much clearer after Larchmont Lad has run in Thursday’s Craven Stakes and Barney Roy has taken in the Greenham at Newbury on Saturday.

We have already seen Andre Fabre’s unbeaten Al Wukair throw down a Guineas marker in the Prix Djebel earlier this month and I have a feeling that the opposition to Churchill is going to be cranked up again after this week.

Now, at last, three weeks after The Lincoln, the turf flat season can really get going.

Ruth Carr can train all right!

Spare a thought for David Nicholls who relinquished his training licence earlier in the year. Not one but two of his former runners, Kimberella and (at last) Sovereign Debt picked up some great prize money for their new trainers, Richard Fahey and Ruth Carr respectively, at Lingfield last Friday.

Fahey also bagged the big £100,000 Burradon Stakes at Newcastle too and it will be fascinating to see how Forest Ranger, who is not in the Guineas, is campaigned because I thought he looked good. He has an entry in the Dante next month.

Ms Carr probably enjoyed the best day of her training career as her only other runners that afternoon, Art Collection and Chaplin Bay, both obliged at Newcastle. 

She has made a habit of doing well with other people’s cast-offs and, like Sovereign Debt, her other two winners indeed started their careers elsewhere. Chaplin Bay was a pretty exposed maiden when joining the North Yorkshire trainer from David Wachman a year ago but he has now won three. 

Art Collection is unbeaten in two starts since joining her from Gary Moore (bought for just 16,000 guineas) so she must be doing something right. 

Grandfather David Chapman would have been proud. Let’s hope she can build on it.

Yorkhill v Ruby

Yorkhill’s wayward tendencies certainly cost him the Ryanair Gold Cup at Fairyhouse on Sunday, a race which proved to be compulsive viewing.

If Ruby Walsh, one of the most naturally talented jockeys of all time, was having problems with Yorkhill, you can only imagine how hard a ride he must be.

After jumping the first fence violently to his left, the writing was on the wall for a unique battle between horse and man. Yorkhill then pulled like a train and ended up making the running, always sacrificing ground and momentum by continuing to jump markedly to his left.

At the final fence, he almost refused and any lesser jockey would surely have come off as Yorkhill decelerated quickly before jumping the fence oh so slowly. Even then, Ruby got him rocking again and they just failed to pull the race out of the fire.

With Might Bite as well as Yorkhill around for next season, things are never going to be dull with these two mercurial characters around. The fact that both horses are looked after by two of the greatest training practitioners ever, in Nicky Henderson and Willie Mullins, only adds to the intrigue. Will these two young chasers ever learn to make the most of their brilliant talent? It will be fun finding out.

You have to wonder whether the Mullins team will ever seriously consider running Yorkhill right-handed again which would seem to rule out a match with Might Bite at Kempton next December, more’s the pity.

Our Duke scales Grand heights at Fairyhouse

I felt a bit sheepish heading off to Plumpton on Monday where there were just 28 runners spread across seven races. 

The same number lined up for the Irish National alone over at Fairyhouse, including those 13 Gigginstown multi-coloured caps which dominated the card. I thought Des Scahill acquitted himself very well.

It was clear throughout that Our Duke was travelling so easily and he duly hacked up. I have not seen an easier winner of this since Desert Orchid coasted home after a last fence scare in 1990.

Like Dessie, Our Duke totally outclassed them and this on just his fourth chase start. With Sizing John and Our Duke in her care, Jessie Harrington must be the envy of Messrs Mullins, Elliott at al and how exciting does the staying chase division now look for next season?

It’s an “anything you can do” scenario and now it’s over to Sizing John for his turn in next Wednesday’s Coral Punchestown Gold Cup. We had assumed Sizing John was the best staying chaser in Ireland. After Monday, he may not even be the best in his stable!


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