Time was when there were two jockeys who better than anyone else on the run-in to Cheltenham felt the form pulse either side of the Irish Sea. However, now that Ruby Walsh has stepped off the airport treadmill, there's only Barry Geraghty left, the man who possibly more than anyone can sense where the balance of power lies. If he's lonely though, he hides it well.
“It was usually the case that myself and Ruby would see each other on the way home, usually at Heathrow with three minutes to spare, running to get on the plane,” Geraghty grins, anticipating the obvious question as to which of the two great jockeys made the running. “I wouldn’t be a sprinter – but I’d outpace him! I would generally leave him behind, and end up holding up the plane for him. It’s understandable, I suppose: all those hip and leg injuries – he’s slowing up!”
The yarn is typical of the man who’s won everything there is to win at Cheltenham, and practically everywhere else too. If Walsh doesn’t quite approach Tony McCoy in terms of gimlet-eyed intensity, no one could mistake him for a chuckler either. Geraghty though has always worn the pressures and stresses of life as a top jockey with a nonchalance that’s easy to warm to.
It can't be the full story: one doesn't carve out one of the great riding careers in jump racing history by humour alone. But neither does he believe in depicting the career he's chosen as some hand-wringing road-to-the-cross. Britain's champion trainer, and all-time Cheltenham festival winning-most handler, Nicky Henderson, learned long ago that there's no one better to have on your side on the big day than Geraghty.
Champion jockey at 20
He's going to be 35 in September, a long way from the boy wonder who was champion jockey at 20. A year before that he first rode at the festival. Fishin' Joella the mare was called, finished fifth in the Coral Cup. He sat in the jockey's room alongside Dunwoody and Swan and didn't feel particularly overawed. That's 15 festivals ago.
“You know when lads say it feels like yesterday, not 15 years? Well that feels like 15 years. I was doing 9.12; that’s 15 years alright,” he says. Pitched the question as to how his 19-year-old self would respond to being told what lay ahead, Geraghty responds: “I’d have said don’t be taking the piss. Nobody could fancy their chances of things going the way they’ve gone. I’ve been very lucky.”
All told there have been 28 festival wins. Twice he has been leading rider for the week. And it’s worth recalling that when Punjabi sprang a 22/1 shock in the Champion Hurdle five years ago, it completed his set of major championship prizes at Cheltenham; before Walsh, and McCoy has yet to do it.
Kicking King and Bobs Worth have won the Gold Cup: Iris’s Gift the World Hurdle: Moscow Flyer kicked off five wins in the Champion Chase: that 2012 Ryanair win on Riverside Theatre is still acclaimed as one of the great rides in festival history although Geraghty himself places that test of strength well behind Punjabi’s tactically-nuanced effort in his own private hall-of-fame.
Sprinter Sacre won’t be there this time, but Bobs Worth is favourite to defend the Gold Cup crown, and the slumbering giant that is the Henderson yard is possibly on the verge of bursting back into life after a relatively somnolent winter.
“I wouldn’t describe it as frustrating. It’s just been a little quieter. Obviously it’s disappointing about Sprinter, but Triolo D’Alene won the Hennessy and Bobs Worth won the Leuxs so they were great days. Day to day, it maybe hasn’t been as great as other seasons but the ground has been a big issue. Nicky doesn’t like running them on very testing ground.
"He told me weeks ago he was going to hang on with the Cheltenham horses and that's what he's done. He has prepped them at home, and there's no one better at that when it comes to the festival," Geraghty says.
Formidable team
Even with Sprinter Sacre out the Henderson team is typically formidable with no doubt now that Bobs Worth is very much its leader. After a worryingly sub-par return to action at Haydock in November, the Lexus over Christmas was as welcome as it was an eye-opener to many who may have categorised the triple-festival winner as a slogger. There was nothing ploddish about his acceleration from the last at Leopardstown.
“It was no surprise to me. This horse won a two-mile novice hurdle around Kempton, beat Rock On Ruby over two and a half; he has pace. He will prefer better ground than last year when it was softer than ideal,” Geraghty says.
“He won on guts. He’s a horse that tries so hard it takes its toll and it can take him a while to recover. That’s why it was good to run in the Lexus. If we’d waited for the Argento, on the ground that was there, he’d only have recovered now.”
As for the Anglo-Irish balance of power, he doesn’t know, although he suspects the all-important novice ranks are wide open.
"I don't see a stand-out, in any of the novices, and usually there's one. There's nothing head-and-shoulders above everything else. I know lads will argue that Vautour and Briar Hill might be but they don't look show-stoppers yet," he offers.
Every chance
"Finding favourites is easy but plenty of us will fancy our chances. I think you'll see fellas riding third, fourth, fifth favourites believing they've a big chance. It looks very competitive."
At 1.30 tomorrow, the whole thing kicks off with a Supreme Novices Hurdle which provides a good illustration of that competition. And even for a festival stalwart, there’s always a target. Geraghty has never won the Supreme: even Sprinter Sacre and Kicking King got beat in it. Behind the jokes, that will be more than enough for the ultimate competitor to zero in on.
