THE Coffey family have enjoyed some of their best days in racing thanks to a mare, so it comes as little surprise that they are fans of racing fillies over jumps, and any incentive that comes with it. The object of their affections, home-bred Mrs Milner, progressed through the ranks, from winning a mares’ maiden hurdle at Thurles, to a mares’ handicap hurdle at the Galway Festival.

She went close against geldings, getting within a neck of On The Blind Side in a listed hurdle at Cheltenham’s November meeting and later triumphed at the Festival, capturing the Grade 3 Pertemps Network Final Handicap Hurdle by five lengths and returned the following year to finish third in the Grade 1 Mares’ Hurdle.

She is now retired from racing, but her path to success inspires big dreams for any successors at Paul Nolan’s Wexford yard, including her younger brother, but the winner I spoke to Jim Coffey about is Tequila Talkin’, who proved a cut above her rivals in a mares’ maiden hurdle at Wexford last month.

“I was there with my daughter Charlotte, who is heavily involved in it,” Coffey recalls. “She’s into show jumping and she’s big time into the horses. She even has ridden out for the Nolans too. The ‘formal owners’ [Tequila Talkin’ races in names of Jim’s wife, Anne Coffey, and sister, Susan Spence] couldn’t make it, but myself and Charlotte thoroughly enjoyed it. I have to say, we’ve been very fortunate at Wexford, we’ve had a number of nice winners there.”

More to come

Sent off second favourite to Willie Mullins’ 8/13 fancy Mummy Derry, the chesnut travelled strongly throughout and went on to score by six lengths, with another six and a half lengths back to the third. On whether he expected her to win in the manner she did, Coffey replies: “Well, she had a couple of decent runs coming back. I think Willie had something very nice in it and you never know with Willie; he can arrive with an airplane, but we were very positive on our chances.

“Because she’s progressive and the year off has actually helped her somewhat to calm down a bit, although you wouldn’t have known it watching the last day. We think she’s very nice and we’re hopeful she’ll keep progressing.”

Tequila Talkin’ enjoyed a change of luck, which made her maiden win all the sweeter, her owner explains: “First time out for us at Fairyhouse, she was travelling beautifully and she over-extended and came a cropper.

“In that particular instance, she picked up an injury, and so she was off for a year, but we always liked her, and we always thought she was going to be really nice and we took our time with her.”

The cherry on top came in the shape of the Weatherbys ITBA NH Fillies Bonus worth €7,500, on top of the winning prize of €6,000.

“The bonus is a fantastic incentive, I have to say,” Coffey comments without encouragement. “We’ve had an awful lot of success with mares; we had Mrs Milner, who probably won a bonus somewhere along the route. It’s great to have another Flemensfirth mare who’s won the bonus.

“We bred Mrs Milner ourselves, but over the last few years we’ve bought a number of mares, as well as breeding them. We bought Tequila Talkin’ from Colin Bowe. Like most Flemensfirth mares, she has a fantastic pedigree. In her point-to-point, she fell at the last when she was leading and going to win. She didn’t even fall; she unseated her rider. We bought her off that performance.”

All positive

The Coffeys are part of a growing number of owners keen on National Hunt fillies, he continues: “The bonus is a great way to encourage more people to own mares. We’ve seen some fantastic mares down the years, like Honeysuckle. When you do find a really good mare, it’s fantastic.

“What we found with Mrs Milner and what we’re finding with Tequila Talkin’, is that they progress, more so than the geldings do.”

Speaking of progression, the Nolan team and Coffey family are hopeful that there is more to come from Tequila Talkin’. On future plans, Coffey comments: “At the moment, she’s on a bit of a break, but I think she’ll probably run again a couple of times before Christmas. You never know… You want to get them to Leopardstown, you want to get them to Cheltenham, but we’ll have to see how she progresses. But we do really like her.”

As younger horses come into work and older horses approach the end of their summer break, it’s an exciting time of year for those with National Hunt horses. Including the four and five-year-olds coming through, the Coffeys have close to 20 in training, Jim Coffey explains: “My whole family are into horses and the horses race in the names of my wife, Anne Coffey, and my sister, Susan Spence.

“We still have Mrs Milner, who we bred ourselves, and we still have her mother, plus another four or five broodmares. We have a combination of horses we buy and horses we breed ourselves. So, we have some nice young horses coming through, which is nice.”