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The Irish wrote an anthem for Cottage Rake, the first horse from Ireland to win the Cheltenham Gold Cup three times, while the second, Arkle, transcended the sport to become an Irish cultural icon. And when Best Mate, trained in Wantage by the endearingly odd couple of Henrietta Knight and Terry Biddlecombe, completed his Gold Cup hat-trick nearly 40 years later, he too broke out of the back pages and into the mainstream of sporting celebrity.
Twenty-one years on from the tearful scenes that accompanied Best Mate’s third Gold Cup, however, it feels as though there is rather less of a fanfare, in Britain at least, for Galopin Des Champs, who will attempt to become only the fifth horse ever to win three Gold Cups at Cheltenham on Friday afternoon. Perhaps it is a sign of British insularity, or even a smidge of pique after a decade when Irish jumpers have carried all before them at Cheltenham. The increasingly fractured media landscape, with a dwindling number of events that can unite an audience in a shared experience, is probably a factor too.
And yet, if Galopin Des Champs can justify his odds-on quotes and complete the Gold Cup hat-trick, he will fully deserve to take his place alongside four of the sport’s most celebrated champions. There is even an argument that winning three Gold Cups in the modern era, in which an increasingly efficient, big-money market for jumps horses ensures that the best talents are inevitably funnelled towards the festival, is an even tougher assignment than it was in the early years of the century, never mind the mid-1960s when Arkle reigned supreme.
Ireland’s racing fans understand. The reception for Galopin Des Champs after his third straight win in the Irish Gold Cup last month was a passionate and heartfelt tribute to Willie Mullins’s chaser that seemed to take even his trainer slightly by surprise. “Huge,” Mullins said later. “I’d never seen anything like it. It was just a tremendous reception.”
Most fans in Ireland are also familiar with Galopin Des Champs’s “origin” story, rooted in the moment when Goshen, trained in Sussex by Gary Moore, galloped towards the final flight in the 2020 Triumph Hurdle with an apparently unassailable lead, only to crash out and hand an unexpected victory to Mullins’s filly Burning Victory, the first horse to run at the meeting in the colours of Greg and Audrey Turley. The Turleys were so delighted by the win that Greg rang Mullins the next day and asked him get them “another nice one”, and their journey with Galopin Des Champs had begun.
But while Ireland’s racing fans have taken him to their hearts, the annual Irish pilgrimage to Cheltenham has declined in recent years. A majority of the crowd at the track on Friday will be British racing fans, watching Galopin Des Champs for the first and only time this year.
Here too, Mullins’s chaser differs from Arkle, who was a regular in Britain’s major races through the season, often under top weight in a handicap, and hugely popular on both sides of the Irish Sea as a result.
But Galopin Des Champs would be unbeaten in four outings at the festival were it not for an inexplicable stumble after jumping the last well clear in a Grade One novice here in 2022, having also won the handicap hurdle that closes out the meeting the previous year.
That record alone should make him one of the great festival favourites already, and if a third Gold Cup win cannot complete the job, then nothing will. And unlike Mullins’s Al Boum Photo, who came up short as a 9-4 shot when attempting a third straight win in 2021, it is very hard to see Galopin Des Champs being beaten.
With the sole exception of his stumble three years ago, Galopin Des Champs has scarcely made a mistake in any of his previous starts at the festival, but the real secret to his dominance, the special power that sets him apart not only from the current crop of chasers but all but a handful of the greats of the past, is the raw finishing power that kicks in as he closes out a race.
There were two horses within a length of Galopin Des Champs as they drew towards the last fence in the Irish Gold Cup at Leopardstown last month, and two more just another length or so behind. And yet, it was possible to say with near-100pc certainty that if Galopin Des Champs cleared it, he had the race in the bag.
There is simply no living with him if he is in front over the last. Even after setting a strong pace for three miles, Galopin Des Champs still pours it on all the way to the line, and often looks for all the world as if he is only just hitting his stride and ready to go around again.
Galopin Des Champs’s finishing kick is brutal, magnificent and irresistible, and promises to give the biggest crowd of the week a moment to cherish. As a successor to Golden Miller, Cottage Rake, Arkle and Best Mate, greatness awaits for Galopin Des Champs if he can get the job done, and perhaps, at last, the recognition that he richly deserves.
