The turf
Thrills and spills
Robin Oakley
We can always celebrate the glorious uncertainty of racing. But I have to admit it comes more easily after a 16-1 winner. Six weeks short of the Festival which stirs the red corpuscles of every true jumping enthu- siast, Cheltenham staged the perfect dress- rehearsal on Saturday with thrills, spills and a performance of real class.
The class was provided by Noel Chance's Looks Like Trouble, who had flopped mis- erably on his last outing in Kempton's King George VI Chase. That day, his trainer said at Cheltenham, Looks Like Trouble ran as if he had had 561b weights attached to each of his back legs. In Cheltenham's Pillar Chase Norman Williamson set off in front, with the horse obviously enjoying himself and, for the most part, jumping like a rooftop reindeer in a fairy story. In the end, although he tired and messed up the last CI was wrong, the horse was right,' said Norman Williamson, who had asked him to pop the fence), Looks Like Trouble beat last year's Gold Cup second, Go Ballistic, out of sight.
'He had to do it and he did it,' said his relieved trainer. Half expecting to be called in by the stewards to explain the improved running of the horse, Noel still had no explanation for what had occurred at Kempton, although he suspected it must have been the gluey ground that day. They had tested for everything: 'But you can't fa what you can't find.'
Even the ever-equable Noel had looked strained when I met him and Mary as the horses went to the start. Afterwards he agreed: 'I'd put myself under pressure com- ing here. What was I going to say if he'd turned in another performance like Kemp- ton?' But there he doesn't do himself jus- tice. Before or after a celebratory Guinness Noel is the kind of man who, if put to it, could find a non-military explanation for every faller in the Charge of the Light Brigade. And it is wholly for the good of racing that a man who has been through it all, from having to have a winner on a Fri- day if he was to pay the wages on Saturday, is now in with a real chance of training his second Gold Cup winner after Mr Mulligan (whose triumph with his dicky legs was one of the training feats of recent years).
Asked how the two horses compare, Noel said he would never to do anything to run down Mr Mulligan, 'but Looks Like Trouble is a quicker horse. You can ride him to put him anywhere in a race.' On this occasion, though, it was the big eight-year-old's jump- ing which won him the race. He was taking lengths off his rivals in the air. There is still an equine machine called See More Business to beat, but Looks Like Trouble is real each- way value at 6-1.
Just how crucial negotiation of the obsta- cles can be was shown in the Marchpole Cleeve Hurdle. The talented Wahiba Sands shocked punters by falling at the first.
'All our customer advisers are busy at the moment. You are held in a queue and your call will be answered as soon as possible . . . ' Then, in the epic duel which followed between Venetia Williams's game little mare Lady Rebecca and Nicky Hender- son's exciting prospect Bacchanal, the big chestnut gelding would surely have pre- vailed if he had been half as foot-perfect over the hurdles as the catlike Lady Rebec- ca. Having flat-footed one or two he would probably have won still had he not muffed the last as Mick Fitzgerald and Norman Williamson, two great jockeys at the peak of their powers, drove their mounts at it with the lack of inhibition of toddlers jumping into a paddling-pool. The bigger fences will probably be Bacchanal's game in the end but we surely have an epic con- test ahead for the Stayers Hurdle.
No sooner had we been wagging our heads after that one, muttering that 'jump- ing is the name of the game', than Hender- son's Makounji proved in the next, the Ladbroke Trophy Chase, that, with enough talent, you can get away with it. The French-bred bay mare consistently jumped to the right, but kept running away from her rivals on the flat. I was glad she did. Having known how much her stable fan- cied her at Cheltenham last year, only for her to run a disappointing race at the Festi- val and turn out to be in season, I had decidpd to ignore this season's form figures of 0 and Pulled Up and give her one more chance. That 16-1 was a nice reward for loyalty.
The other shock of the day had been provided in the first when Jonjo O'Neill's Master Tern ran out a surprise winner at 20-1. Since the horse had been beaten 39 lengths on his previous outing at Newcastle in November the stewards inquired into his improvement in form and adjourned their hearing to collect more evidence. Fair enough. Punters like these questions answered. But with Jonjo not present I doubt if there was anything untoward. The horse, after all, is owned by the legendary gambler J.P. McManus. And no horse owned by JP and seriously fancied by the stable wins at 20-1.
Perhaps the final slice of Cheltenham flavour was provided not by JP but by AP. Tony McCoy, known to many as AP, rode on the French Furze one of those races where you knew he would have dismounted and carried his horse across the line if that had been required for a victory. Having led all the way and stolen lengths off his rivals with a sudden injection of pace at one stage of the race, McCoy then started winding up his mount fully five hurdles out. When Coulthard maintained contact it looked as though he had set up the race for another. But McCoy kept driving on the few drops of petrol left in the tank. It was awesome. Ills mount was out on his feet at the last. But so, by then, was the rest of the field and AP had no problem nursing him home up the hill. I really doubt if anybody else could have done it.
Robin Oakley is political editor of the BBC.
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