CHELTENHAM, England - He needed 13 tries, but champion jockey A.P. McCoy scored his first winner of this week’s Cheltenham Festival when Uxizandre led throughout Thursday’s $470,250 Ryanair Chase at 2 1/2 miles at Cheltenham Racecourse.
McCoy, the 19-time champion steeplechase jockey who is retiring next month, was winless on the first two days on Tuesday and Wednesday of the four-day festival for hurdlers and chasers, and with his first two mounts on Thursday.
CHELTENHAM, England – Perhaps it is fitting that jockey A P McCoy will ride his final Cheltenham Gold Cup on Friday on a 9-year-old gelding named Carlingford Lough. Both started their careers in Ireland and are at the top of their games.
McCoy, 40, will retire at the end of the steeplechase season in late April, the date of his final ride yet to be confirmed. He is on course to win the British steeplechase jockey title for an unprecedented 20th consecutive year. He has won more than 4,300 races, an all-time record.
CHELTENHAM, England - Faugheen led a parade of winners for Irish trainer Willie Mullins and jockey Ruby Walsh at Cheltenham Racecourse on Tuesday, stretching his unbeaten record to nine races with a frontrunning win in the $600,000 Champion Hurdle.
Mullilns and Walsh combined to win three races on the seven-race card. Earlier in the day, they teamed to win the $180,000 Supreme Novices’ Hurdle at 2 1/16 miles with 2-1 favorite Douvan, and the $225,000 Arkle Trophy for novice chasers at two miles with Un De Sceaux, the 4-6 favorite.
CHELTENHAM, England – Experience may be required to win Wednesday’s $532,000 Queen Mother Champion Chase at two miles over fences at Cheltenham Racecourse.
The field of three includes three former winners – Sizing Europe, the 13-year-old who won the race in 2011; and two 9-year-olds – Sprinter Sacre, the 2013 winner; and Sire de Grugy, who won last year.
There are 11 runners in the Queen Mother Champion Chase, the top race on the second of the four-day National Hunt festival, which continues through Friday.
The numbers are phenomenal.
In the four-day National Hunt festival for steeplechasers and hurdlers at Cheltenham Racecourse in the west of England from Tuesday through Friday, Irish trainer Willie Mullins may have as many as 50 runners in 27 races.
The Mullins team ranges from largely untested 4-year-olds in Friday’s two-mile Triumph Hurdle to the 11-year-old Hurricane Fly, who has won an astonishing 22 Grade 1 races from late 2008 through January this year.
Super Saturday was super at least for Godolphin and trainer Saeed bin Suroor, who swept the last three races on the program, including a win in the Group 1 Al Maktoum Challenge Round 3 with African Story, their 2014 Dubai World Cup winner.
African Story now is set to line up in the March 28 World Cup, something that seemed far from certain after the 8-year-old finished second in Round 2 of the Maktoum Challenge, his first start since his surprise score nearly a year ago in the World Cup and his first try on dirt.
Friday, Toast of New York, the runner-up in the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita last November, has been declared from the Dubai World Cup, trainer Jamie Osborne said.
“Toast of New York has picked up a soft tissue injury and unfortunately won’t be able to run,” Osborne told the Racing Post of England.
Toast of New York was favored over California Chrome with British bookmakers to win the Dubai World Cup. Toast of New York is based in England and was being trained up to the Dubai World Cup.
The Group 1, $400,000 Al Maktoum Challenge Round 3 highlights the so-called Super Saturday card on Saturday evening at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai. And for whoever wins, victory is likely to be the highlight of their Dubai campaign in 2015.
The Al Maktoum Challenge is the last in a series of older-male dirt stakes at Meydan, and as the zenith of that trio of races, it functions just fine, but as a potential prep for the $10 million Dubai World Cup on March 28, the race should prove lacking.
Godolphin’s two heavy favorites, Local Time in the UAE Oaks and Safety Check in the Zabeel Mile, both scored comfortable wins on the Thursday night card at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai.
Safety Check, trained by Charlie Appleby and ridden by William Buick, scored by one length over Dark Emerald in the Group 2, $250,000 Zabeel Mile, a one-turn turf race, and while not as visually impressive as his last-start score in the Al Fahidi Fort over about seven furlongs on turf, the win at this furlong-longer trip was solid enough.
A pair of group stakes with likely heavy favorites highlight Thursday’s seven-race card at Meydan in Dubai.
Local Time is 2 for 2 in her brief dirt career and will be an odds-on favorite to win her third race of the winter in the Group 3, $250,000 UAE Oaks, while Safety Check appears formidable in the Group 2, $250,000 Zabeel Mile.
The Meydan card starts at 9:45 a.m. Eastern, with the Oaks carded as race 3, post time 10:55, and the Zabeel Mile as race 6, post time 12:40 p.m.
