FOR all the focus on AP McCoy’s Festival bow, there is another story in Cheltenham town this week, an old-fashioned one that involves a horse bred for next to nothing, a family-run stable, an unknown jockey and the memory of one of jump racing’s greatest characters.
The horse is a spindly chaser called Coneygree, nicknamed “Max”. The family is the Bradstocks, Mark and Sara, who train in Letcombe Bassett, Oxfordshire. The jockey is Nico De Boinville, and the whole impossible fairy tale is emotionally bound together by Lord Oaksey, champion amateur rider, writer, broadcaster, founder of the Injured Jockeys’ Fund and Sara’s father, whose name still brings warmth and laughter more than two years after his death.
Let’s start at the beginning with a tiny mare called Plaid Maid, bought from Ireland to keep my noble Lord contented in his retirement. Plaid Maid had plenty of ability but fragile legs and it was only when Sara and Mark Bradstock discovered the healing qualities of the local watercress fields that the little mare took wing, winning five times. But if Plaid Maid was a revelation on the racetrack, she proved a far better broodmare, producing first the tough but quirky Carruthers, who won the 2011 Hennessy Gold Cup, and now the brilliant and mischievous Coneygree who, if the ground is right and connections take courage, might just become the first novice chaser to win the Gold Cup since Captain Christy in 1974.
Coneygree is quoted at 12-1 to win the Gold Cup and 7-2 for the RSA Chase, which has always been the more natural stepping stone to the senior prize. With a flair for the occasion worthy of Lord Oaksey himself, the Bradstocks are keeping everyone guessing until the last possible moment. The very idea that a small yard, whose annual barometer of success is survival, should have the luxury of choosing between two major races at the Festival is fanciful, not least to the Bradstocks themselves.
“This sort of fairy tale doesn’t happen on the Flat any more and it’s happening less frequently over jumps too,” says Sara.
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“We often wonder whether we’re doing the right thing when it’s cold and wet and miserable and another horse has gone lame. I don’t mind the hardship, what makes me think about giving up at times is the endless trying to stay afloat. We feed the horses the best but we have baked beans on toast and don’t go on holiday. That’s just how it is.”
In guiding King Harald to a Festival win and Carruthers to a Hennessy, the Bradstocks have shown their ability to make the most of unpromising stock, yet their string rarely numbers more than 15 as the new breed of owner increasingly gravitates towards the slicker winning factories on both sides of the Irish Sea. Victory for Coneygree might help to redress the balance.
“I’m not saying the big trainers aren’t geniuses,” says Sara. “I’m just saying that they have so many horses that there might be one or two who would like to come to a smaller yard. Coneygree couldn’t be trained in a big yard, he’s too crazy. But I’d love it if he did make people think. If they have a horse in the back yard of a big trainer, why not give someone else a go?”
The Bradstocks are learning, too, that having a potential superstar in the yard brings unwanted attention. Gloria Victis, the last top-class novice to contest the Gold Cup, was killed in the race 15 years ago and the recriminations — and fears — have resurfaced at the very thought of a three-chase novice taking the same route.
“I’ve had so many emails, but these people don’t know the horse,” says Sara. “The thought of Gloria Victis is terrifying for us because they are our babies, but he didn’t die because he was in the Gold Cup, he died because he had a horrible fall. It could have happened anywhere.
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“It could be that if Silviniaco Conti doesn’t get up the hill the Gold Cup will be the easier race. Every time we’ve upped the ante with him, he’s said: ‘Come on, what’s the problem, I’m cool’. He can be silly on the way home from the gallops because he gets bored. But once he’s racing, that’s what he likes to do.”
The eight-year-old’s three races over fences have been won by a total of just under 50 lengths. Carruthers and a younger sibling, Flintham, are also set to run this week. It could not possibly be that all three win. Could it?