Rarely can there have been such a glorious weekend for Welsh racing. A pair of gallant galloping greys made Saturday a great day. Less than an hour after Jack Tudor (photographed) rode King Turgeon to victory in the Grand Sefton Chase at Aintree, Al Dancer ran his rivals ragged for the all-Welsh combination of owner Dai Walters, trainer Sam Thomas and jockey Callum Pritchard to win the Badger Beer Chase at Wincanton.
The eleven-year-old Al Dancer is nearly white now and produced a Desert Orchid-like display of running and jumping in the Badger Beer. He set a blistering pace over the 3m1f course and while most observers thought the old boy – who was carrying twelve stone minus his jockey’s seven-pound claim – could not keep it up, he did. He was helped a little by a couple of fallers out in the country and the interference they caused the horses following. But Al Dancer ran on the strongest of those that remained.
The Carmarthenshire-born Pritchard was deputising for Walters’ retained jockey, the suspended Dylan Johnston. His Rules record before the Badger Beer appeared modest, but he was the leading novice male point-to-point jockey in 2022/23 and he’d ridden two winners in the preceding ten days. He was non-committal when asked whether he was being run away with but said Al Dancer was “never out of his comfort zone.”
The SP of 25/1 took no account of his career record of 2111011 in his first race each season. This ten-length win off a career-high mark of 154 will make life tough next time. Nevertheless, perhaps a tilt at the Grand National would be in order.
Earlier, King Turgeon ran and jumped for fun at Aintree, following up his Chepstow win eleven days ago over slightly further, ridden by Harry Cobden. He was always in the front rank and Tudor was unruffled when passed at the Melling Road, letting his horse have a breather. He jumped back into the lead again at the second last and kept on willingly to score by three lengths. This was Tudor’s biggest win for the David Pipe yard.
As if that wasn’t enough, Sean Bowen rode trebles at Aintree and Ffos Las over the weekend. The Aintree threesome will have helped to ease the memory of his fall there on Boxing Day that cost him the jockeys’ title. Two (Haiti Couleurs in the novice chase and Cedar Creek in the bumper) were trained by Rebecca Curtis, who is operating at a 23% strike rate this season.
Two of his Ffos Las winners were trained by Peter and Mickey Bowen. Lermoos Legend had finished in the first four nine times since his last success; the maiden Lady Harriett won a hurdle at the tenth attempt.
There were also wins for David Evans and Jordan Williams (grandson of Bernard Llewellyn) at Chelmsford on Saturday with the improving filly Piranha Roma, and at Sandown for Ben Jones riding Ooh Betty for Dorset trainer Ben Clarke.
Ffos Las race again on Wednesday the 20th.
