IT SEEMS that Michael O’Leary’s children have inherited their father’s habit of speaking frankly.
His two sons Matt and Luke spoke to him on the phone yesterday morning “and they told me ‘Daddy, all your horses are rubbish’,” he said, reflecting the fact that the Ryanair boss had experienced a few near-misses at Cheltenham this week.
But the young critics were proved wrong when Sir Des Champs, ridden by Davy Russell, romped home to win the first race of the day yesterday – the Jewson Novices’ Steeple Chase.
O’Leary was elated and almost hugged a reporter in the excitement. But he wasn’t elated enough to make any rash promises.
Smelling an opportunity, someone asked if he was going to give away some free flights. The Ryanair boss came back to down to earth very quickly. “No, all the Ryanair flights are booked, booked solid and I’m not giving away any free seats,” he said.
The airline executive was particularly excited to have beaten a Nicky Henderson-trained horse. “It’s very refreshing not to finally be looking at Nicky Henderson’s bum which I’ve been looking at all week,” he said.
And the win also garnered a Boylesports €50,000 bonus split between the owner and trainer Willie Mullins because the horse won the novice chase at Leopardstown sponsored by the bookmaker.
Even more elated than the Ryanair boss was actor Jimmy Nesbitt, who came centre stage when his horse Riverside Theatre won the steeplechase sponsored by the airline.
The Northern Ireland actor welled up with emotion but readily admitted “I’d cry at Little House on the Prairie”. It was only when he saw trainer Henderson’s lip trembling that he knew he wasn’t alone.
The horse is named after the Coleraine theatre where the Co Antrim-born actor cut his teeth many moons ago before becoming a household name in television dramas such as Cold Feet. Asked beforehand if the nerves before a race were as bad as pre-stage nerves, he said “acting is easy. This is much harder”.
The win was better than any Oscar, he said. “I’ve done it all now. Barry Geraghty deserves to win the Oscar.” And he probably will, given the winning streak the Meath jockey has been on since he set foot in Prestbury Park this week.
But he left something for fellow Irishman Ruby Walsh, who got the biggest cheer of the day when he won the Ladbrokes’ World Hurdle on Big Buck’s. It was the horse’s record fourth time to win the race and his 16th straight win over hurdles.
Many in the crowd were wearing novelty leprechaun hats to mark the fact that yesterday was dubbed St Patrick’s Thursday by the festival organisers.
Whiskey in the Jar was belting out at 10.45am in the Guinness village and, by midday, uninhibited dancing was in evidence. The Racing Post had bemoaned the lack of debauchery in the Guinness village compared to days of yore but The Irish Times would beg to differ, after battling through the lurching crowds and being poked in the eye by a rogue feather hanging askew from a fascinator.
Swinford man Joe Mellett entered into the spirit of things. He sported a great bunch of shamrock, a green tie and the Mayo scarf. “You should never be afraid to show your colours,” he advised. He had met “thousands” of Irish people on the previous night and predicted that they were all nursing sore heads and sore pockets yesterday.
“Things are bad back home but you try to forget that for a couple of days.” Coolmore Stud PA Wendy Normile will never forget the day she had yesterday when she came third in the St Patrick’s Derby, a charity race for cancer research. She rode JP McManus’s Prince of Fire as a tribute to her trainer brother Alan (36), who died from cancer in late 2010.
She rode out with Mouse Morris in preparation, and trainer Charlie Swan came up trumps with the horse. “To come to Cheltenham and to come into the winners’ enclosure is something else,” she said.
“If you’d told me two months ago that I would be here in these colours, riding in Cheltenham, I’d have said you are absolutely mad.”
