Golden Ace Prevails in Dramatic Champion Hurdle

[Wandering Eyes]

CHELTENHAM, UK — It is a rare thing for a trainer almost to apologise for winning a race, particularly the biggest race of his career, but observers of Jeremy Scott over the years would perhaps have expected nothing less. A man of exemplary manners, he would struggle to take pleasure in triumph in the face of other people's disasters, and there was drama and dismay aplenty in the G1 Unibet Champion Hurdle, won by Scott with the plucky little mare Golden Ace (GB) (Golden Horn {GB}).

“It probably wasn't the prettiest,” Scott said, after the two previous winners of the race fell. First, Constitution Hill (GB) (Blue Bresil {Fr}) fluffed the fourth flight from home and, as Brighterdaysahead (Fr) (Kapgarde {Fr}) took up the running then emptied fast when State Man (Fr) (Doctor Dino {Fr}) cruised by, it appeared to be his for the taking for the second year in a row. The racing gods had other ideas.

The defending champion approached the last five lengths clear, with Paul Townend crouching lower in the saddle in pursuit of his third win of the day for Willie Mullins, but suddenly he was gone, crumpling on landing and leaving Golden Ace to climb the hill unchallenged as Burdett Road (GB) (Muhaarar {GB}), Winter Fog (Ire) (Papal Bull {GB}) and the tiring Brighterdaysahead were hampered as State Man scrambled back to his feet.

Admitting to feeling “flabbergasted”, Scott continued, “It's bizarre but it's fantastic. It's a horse race and anything can happen.”

 

Paul Townend hits the deck as Golden Ace gallops to glory | PA Media

 

Indeed it can. And on a day which will only further inflame the already heated debate over the G1 Close Brothers Mares' Hurdle, Golden Ace has benefitted not only from the mishaps of some of her rivals but from the decision of Rich Ricci and Mullins to keep Lossiemouth (Fr) (Great Pretender {Fr}) to racing against her own sex. The latter duly won for the third time at the Festival, and that decision in turn helped Golden Ace's owner Ian Gosden to opt for the Champion route for his mare against the advice of his trainer and jockey Lorcan Williams. Fortune favours the brave.

“It's unbelievable. I thought we would struggle against Lossiemouth so we thought we might as well have a go at this one,” Gosden said. “We'd already beaten Burdett Road and Brighterdaysahead once each and she was, and still is, unbeaten over two miles. There's a lot of luck in it.

“Constitution Hill came down and I thought he was going to bring her down as well but she just got by him. Then she was third and I thought, 'Well, that's the dream, isn't it?'”

The dream of being placed turned to the realm of near-fantasy for Gosden and Scott, who were enjoying their second consecutive win at the Festival with Golden Ace. She is the first Grade 1 winner for her sire Golden Horn, who is fast rising through the ranks of National Hunt sires. Now seven, she was bred by the Weinfeld family's Meon Valley Stud – Classic-winning owner-breeders on the Flat who also happen to have bred the best National Hunt sire to have stood in Britain in recent years in the late Kayf Tara (GB). Golden Horn, who followed Kayf Tara to Overbury Stud, has now picked up the baton.

“We are lucky that we can give them time and Mr Gosden has been extraordinarily patient as well as being a great chooser of a race,” Scott added with a hearty laugh. “My wife and family are all involved and Camilla does a lot of the work at home and has the patience of a saint.”

He added, “Can you give me a pinch to make sure this isn't a dream.”

With young jumping prospects now regularly changing hands for eye-watering sums, the story of the unraced three-year-old who was picked up for 12,000gns and went on to become a champion is a much needed fillip to the sector, and indeed to Cheltenham Festival lore. The dramatics of the race aside, this was a result that restores the dream of smaller, battling owners and trainers the land over. A surprise but very welcome winner could not have been delivered to a more deserving team of connections.

Why Mares' Races Matter

Five of the last ten runnings of the Champion Hurdle have now been won by four different mares. That these horses are being funnelled through to the top level owes much to the determined expansion and upgrading of the racing programme for National Hunt fillies and mares, with the G1 Close Brothers Mares' Hurdle at its aspirational pinnacle. Some will argue that that race only detracts from the Champion Hurdle. That's tosh.

Only seven mares have won the Champion Hurdle in its 98-year history. That so many of them, relatively speaking, have won in the last decade in open company is because the mares' races at the Festival are there to be aimed at by owners determined to have a Cheltenham winner. One doesn't need too good a memory to recall the days that National Hunt filly foals were all but worthless at sales, and it doesn't take a vivid imagination to guess at the potential welfare concerns if there is weak demand for 50 per cent of a jumps foal crop.

 

Lossiemouth runs her rivals ragged in the Mares' Hurdle | PA Media

 

On both sides of the Irish Sea the work of the respective breeders' associations and racing authorities must be applauded. Through incentive schemes and enhanced racing opportunities they have helped to turn the tide of bias towards fillies rather than against them. No more should a breeder feel utter a private cry of despair at the birth of a filly. At a time when the National Hunt population is declining in Britain, the number of mares in training in the country has risen by 30 per cent since 2012, to 1,526 in 2025.

The stalking triumph of Lossiemouth (Fr) will doubtless have plenty arguing that she should have been running one race later in the Champion Hurdle itself. Perhaps she should, and perhaps she will become the eighth mare to win that race next year, but for now let's applaud the imperious beast that she is and let her owners Rich and Susannah Ricci, who have invested plenty in jumps racing over the years, enjoy another moment in the sun. As we saw so spectacularly on this day, nothing in this sport can ever be taken for granted.

Any Human Heart

Some people may dwell under the misconception that horse racing is just about horses. The horses must come first, always, even those that come last, but entwined in the lives of racehorses are stories imbued with all range of human emotion.

As the action got underway at Prestbury Park on Tuesday and William Munny (Ire), bearing the colours of Barry Connell, scampered up the hill in vain pursuit of Kopek Des Bordes (Fr) it was impossible not to cast minds back almost two years to the day when Marine Nationale (Ire) triumphed in those same colours. They were carried then by Michael O'Sullivan, whose name this year was attached to the Supreme Novices' Hurdle in posthumous tribute, his brother Alan among the crowd as racegoers applauded this bright talent so sadly lost only last month.

 

A day of high draam at Cheltenham | PA Media

 

One race later, Jango Baie (Fr) (Tiger Groom {Fr}) delivered an eye-popping finishing burst not completely dissimilar to his grandsire Arazi in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile more than three decades earlier, to claim the G1 Arkle Chase in the most thrilling finish of the day. One on the board for Nicky Henderson and Nico de Joinville before the crushing disappointment of Constitution Hill, and a balm of even greater comfort to his owner Tony Barney.

“It means a lot to me, as I bought the horse on the day my son got killed. His name was James Barney, the horse is Jango Baie, so the same initials,” he said.

“Phenomenal. Blessed. My son is looking down on me, that's for sure. Where he came from, from the back – from losing to winning. Amazing.”

An association with a horse which began in the depths of despair and, for this day at least, has lifted his owner above the numbing pain which must come with the loss of a child.

Scoreboards barely matter in the wake of such tragedies, but there was a pleasing balance to the origins of the winners. Two for Mullins, of course, and another for Joseph O'Brien and JP McManus with Puturhandstogether (Ire) (Caravaggio) in what we'll still call the Fred Winter, now sponsored by Hallgarten and Novum Wines. Three for Ireland then, and, despite the binary nature of the Prestbury Cup, the four wins for British trainers were actually two for England, one for Scotland and one for Wales, with Lucinda Russell and Rebecca Curtis adding their names to the sheet with Myretown (Ire) (Dylan Thomas {Ire}) and Haiti Couleurs (Fr) (Dragon Dancer {GB}). A properly united kingdom, in sport at least.

 

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