IF it could be said that Willie Mullins has been going through a quieter-than-usual spell to this point in the National Hunt season, it tells you a lot about what business as usual looks like.
He’s still operating at a 23% strike rate in Ireland, where he has sent out 138 winners so far (206 his entire season’s work last term) and he won just the five Grade 1 races from a possible eight at the Dublin Racing Festival, including the Paddy Power Irish Gold Cup with Fact To File. His pre-DRF takings also included a Morgiana Hurdle, Tingle Creek, Leopardstown December Hurdle, Faugheen Novice Chase, Kauto Star Novices’ Chase and a Kerry National.
Still, while emerging with 11 winners, he did have some disappointments over the busy Christmas period, and his total November and December winners of 32 in 2025 was the worst he has managed since 2010.
Asked about whether it was part of his strategy to peak into the spring after a quiet deep winter, Mullins told a press morning (organised by The Jockey Club) this week: “No, I didn’t think things would be as quiet, but it’s the just the way it’s been. We had a very wet time from November right up to Christmas, and I was waiting for a bit less weather, but we might have only got one dry week throughout. There has been so much rain. I was sort of disappointed with how slowly we had been to get into gear. The weather wouldn’t have been a help.
“Thankfully, all the horses are eating and well. We’ve been doing all the various tests, checking hay and straw, and all seems to be fine. Sometimes at that stage of the year, we are a bit slow and people say we’re not going that well, but things come right in the spring. We probably are even a little behind where we typically are this year, though.”
The biggest illustration of that picture is found with a quick glance at the trainers’ table, where Gordon Elliott still holds a €515,630 lead in mid-February.
Asked about a potential championship battle, Mullins says: “I haven’t looked at it. From what I can gather, it’s certainly a lot closer. We’re probably just not firing as well as we have, and maybe it’s that some of our good horses are getting older. You work a lot of things into it and what will be, will be.”
Festival focus
Right now, the 113-time Cheltenham Festival-winning trainer has his gaze firmly fixed on four key days in March at Prestbury Park. With another all-star squad ready to fly the flag for Closutton, there is a natural mix of nerves and excitement that the main players get to Cheltenham without any setbacks over the coming weeks.
“As much as you have to enjoy the build up, you do dread it as well,” says Mullins. “You’re wondering every morning if your team will stay injury-free and you’re hoping it’s not one of your star players. Like anyone who manages a team, no matter what sport it is, you’re going to have injuries. People say pressure is for tyres, but that’s a load of bollocks! It takes a bit of getting through.
“I’m lucky because I have so many nice horses. I always feel for the trainer with one stable star who goes by the way side, because I’ve been that way before years ago. That can be so disappointing.”
Before his annual Cotswolds charge, a rare voyage to Southwell could be on the cards, as the champion trainer of Britain and Ireland teased that he could send a runner to take on Constitution Hill in the specially arranged £40,000 flat novice race on Friday of next week.
“I think every trainer in the country will be trying to find something for the race, and of course I will,” Mullins says.
“I just wonder what the Newmarket yards might have for it, the likes of John Gosden and Roger Varian are all going to pull something out, aren’t they? A £40,000 novice? Of course I’m thinking of running something in it. We’re giving it some thought. The race is going to create a lot of positive publicity for racing, isn’t it? I think it is fine to do. I hadn’t been thinking about it, but I don’t see any negatives. I might even go, you never know.”
Anzadam
Unibet Champion Hurdle
I’ve tried a couple of things and I’ve one or two more things to try, which might make him competitive. I thought he was going to be competitive a little earlier in the year, but we’re a little disappointed as the year has worked out. I haven’t given up hope on him just yet.
Ballyburn
Unibet Champion Hurdle/Paddy Power Stayers’ Hurdle
He has a lot of stamina in his pedigree, so I think that would probably rule him out of the Champion Hurdle.
Bambino Fever
Ryanair Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle
There will be improvement from the day she finished second [to Oldschool Outlaw] at Naas, and then she won at Fairyhouse. She won by 12 lengths there. I’d be hoping that she’d be back to herself by then and it’ll be a proper race. We know our mare jumps, we know she stays the trip, we know she goes on the ground, we know she handles the track - we have a lot of positives going there.
Bentraghhill
Weatherbys Champion Bumper
Going into Christmas, I was thinking if I had one bumper horse it was this one - and he put it in. I was surprised that Patrick [Mullins] didn’t come up to Leopardstown to ride him. He’s a fair machine and will continue to be over the years when he goes jumping.
Dinoblue
Mrs Paddy Power Mares’ Chase
She’s going there all being well after her win in the Opera Hat at Naas last weekend.
Doctor Steinberg
Turners Novices’ Hurdle/Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle
We always thought he was maybe a good-ground summer horse, being by Doctor Dino, though maybe he wasn’t the fastest we’d ever had by the sire. He did win his maiden hurdle at Galway in October, but he has really surprised that he’s come along and done what he’s doing at this stage of his career.
I was watching him at the Dublin Racing Festival and thinking Turners, everyone else seemed to be thinking Albert Bartlett. Then I’m maybe thinking the Bartlett, but I’m looking at how he pulled and dragged his jockey throughout the race - I don’t think you could do that for three miles around Cheltenham. You’ll have a faster pace in the Turners, though that would be a much better race.
I’ll leave it up to Paul Townend. Maybe he’ll find some way of riding him differently. He rode him from the front the other day and he wanted pace, so you could ride him differently in the Albert Bartlett; cover him up and get him to settle. If he told me he could get him to settle, we could probably think of running him in the Albert Bartlett. That’ll be crucial - how he wants to ride him.
Espresso Milan
Turners Novices’ Hurdle/Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle
He’s possible for the Albert Bartlett. He’s only had two runs over hurdles, and I often think horses need more experience than that to win the Albert Bartlett. I always thought they’d ideally need four or five runs minimum, though maybe that’s changing now.
Fact To File
Ryanair Chase/Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup (needs to be supplemented)
If you go back to November, Fact To File was the Irish banker for the Ryanair and there was no doubt about it. And then he comes out and he did what he did in the Irish Gold Cup, and you’ve got to remember it’s not like J.P. [McManus] is an ordinary owner. He has so many horses - Spillane’s Tower for one - who he can run in the Gold Cup with a live chance and still keep Fact To File in the Ryanair. He’s been in the game longer than any of us are here. He’s seen the ups and downs, ins and outs of it, so I’m going to respect whatever he says to me.
We haven’t really spoken about whether he’ll be supplemented for the Gold Cup and I don’t think there’s any need at this stage, because they’re all within a few days of one another. A lot will depend between now and then on what horses turn up or are going to turn up, and I think that will influence his decision later in the day rather than earlier in the day. I know sometimes he likes to make early decisions, but this is different I think. I wouldn’t really be training him any different to run over the Ryanair trip or the Gold Cup trip.
Final Demand
Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase
We were all underwhelmed at Christmas, though Patrick said he just didn’t want to give him a squeeze at Limerick when he felt he had the race won and didn’t want to risk turning him upside down. I was hoping that there might have been more in the tank that day, but there obviously wasn’t. We’re just wondering, was it ground - it was horrendous, very testing ground both at Limerick and Leopardstown.
Then, he looks like a horse who wants that type of ground and would be better on it, so I thought ‘are we missing something at home in the way we are training or handling him?’ We’ve put a lot of thought into that and are changing a few things at home. I remember we turned Vautour around in two days and we have a month for this guy. That’s what we’re trying to do. We think he has the ability, but we have just got to get that spark back into him.
Gaelic Warrior
Ryanair Chase/Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup
He’s in good form. He had a hard race at Christmas [when third in the King George VI Chase] and he had a hard race the other day [when second in the Irish Gold Cup]. He ran fantastic in both races. He also does run well at Cheltenham all the time.
I thought his run in the Irish Gold Cup was ideal for the Ryanair, myself. I just thought the way he ran his race, I wouldn’t have any problem going back there. But maybe if I analyse it a bit more and get a few more opinions, I might change my mind. I just thought that was a hell of a run.
Galopin Des Champs
Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup
He had a very hard race at Christmas for his first run [when third in the Savills Chase], which I didn’t like but we had to do it. He had a nice race the other day [when third in the Irish Gold Cup]; he was tough enough but I just felt that maybe his Christmas race impacted a little bit on his finishing position at the DRF. But he needed that. As he gets older, I think he probably needs softer ground, so if the ground comes really right, that’ll be a big help to him. I think the horse himself is in good order.
Hurricane Fly regained a Champion Hurdle before and this guy is going to try the same in the Gold Cup. I think he’s still of an age where he’s competitive and I think he still has the ability, though he’ll need some luck.
It’s a possibility that he could wear cheekpieces in the Gold Cup. When those horses get older then maybe there’s no harm in trying cheekpieces. Try something anyhow. I thought he ran a great race the other day. He partook from the start, whereas last year [at Cheltenham] he didn’t. It took him three or four fences to warm up, didn’t it? I saw he was sixth or seventh and wondered what had happened. Then I was surprised that he warmed up coming down the hill and got into the race. Maybe in the end, he got there too soon. The winner [Inothewayurthinkin] won very well, though.
It would be fantastic if he could do it again, and Audrey and Greg [Turley] are such good owners. The horse loves people too. For example, when we were out with him [in Leighlinbridge for a parade after winning the Gold Cup], we thought we’d just be half an hour but people wanted their photograph with him. He was standing there with kids and licking them. He’s just a lovely individual. One kid came over in a wheelchair and the horse just put his head in his lap - it was extraordinary to see.
In comparison to when we had I Am Maximus here [for a parade], he was sort of biting babies and kicking people! We had to get him out of the place in two minutes…
Il Etait Temps
BetMGM Queen Mother Champion Chase/Ryanair Chase
He has an entry in the Ryanair, but I think he’ll run in the Champion Chase. He was all right after the fall at Ascot, a bit shaken but he’s back riding out. He seems to have a bit of spark in him again, but there was no spark in him that day. He surprised me with how he won at Sandown last year and then came back and repeated it in the Tingle Creek. I was hoping he could do that at Ascot, but he didn’t.
Impaire Et Passe
Ryanair Chase/Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup
He’s due to run this weekend in the Red Mills Chase at Gowran. It might be a plan for him to go to Aintree after that.
Jade De Grugy
Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase/Close Brothers Mares’ Hurdle/Mrs Paddy Power Mares’ Chase
I don’t know where she goes yet. She’s in the Mares’ Hurdle, isn’t she? We have her kept in there just in case. We don’t know what might happen, she’d be entitled to run if we thought the Mares’ Chase would be won by a stablemate. She’s also won a Grade 2 chase at Thurles this season. We’ll see.
Kaid d’Authie
Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase
He won at the Dublin Racing Festival and is obviously a very good horse. He disappointed me last season; I always thought he was way better than that, but he’s showing now what he always showed me at home.
Kappa Jy Pyke
Singer Arkle Challenge Trophy Novices’ Chase/Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase
I know the owners would love to go, they’re from Cheshire and it’d be a dream to have a chance there. Then I’m thinking of looking at the WillowWarm Gold Cup at Fairyhouse; that looks to me an obvious target to him. However, those novice races could cut up at Cheltenham. Those are the thoughts we’re having at the moment.
Kargese
Singer Arkle Challenge Trophy Novices’ Chase/Close Brothers Mares’ Hurdle/Mrs Paddy
Power Mares’ Chase
Yes [I’d imagine it is the Arkle for her]. That was a tremendous run from her in the Irish Arkle.
King Rasko Grey
SkyBet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle/Turners Novices’ Hurdle
He was third to what I think are the two best novice hurdlers in Ireland at the Dublin Racing Festival [Talk The Talk and Ballyfad]. Looking at the three of them jumping the last, I was thinking ‘God, my fellow looks like a mare in foal compared to those two’. I think he has every chance of improving more than them, condition-wise. I think he’ll come right into it at Cheltenham. Being by Galiway, he should have enough speed for the Supreme and the experience of what he learned at Leopardstown will be a huge help, but your first thought, especially with the way he won at Limerick, would be Turners. All those things are in the mix.
Kitzbuhel
Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase
I’m not sure we got the tactics right last time [when falling in the Scilly Isles], to jump a three-mile horse out behind two-and-a-half-milers and not take the race by the scruff of the neck.
Kopek Des Bordes
Singer Arkle Challenge Trophy Novices’ Chase
It might be spoken about in the run-up to the race that not many horses have won an Arkle with only one chasing start behind them, but you’d have to ask the question - how many horses have even gone to the Arkle with just one run before? Maybe there’s not many who have tried. Maybe it’s a good statistic! I believe Well Chief and Western Warhorse managed to do it off one start. Western Warhorse beat Champagne Fever that year and I still see the replay sometimes and wonder if our horse came out on top!
Every time you look at it, you wonder how he got beaten. We are up against it experience-wise, but it’s well known how well he worked recently at Punchestown. I read that someone described it as an “explosive” piece of work. You know me, it’s not my style to say that, but he worked very well. I put him in against other good horses and they went two miles over fences at racing speed. The objective was to do what a race at Leopardstown would do.
I wanted to particularly do it on the same day as a race meeting too, to replicate that setting, but without the hardship that running in the Irish Arkle would entail.
I wanted a good hard bit into him, without it being too hard work, and he did it well. The further and faster he jumped, the better he jumped. But we are probably up against it statistically.
Laurets d’Estruval
SkyBet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle/Turners Novices’ Hurdle/Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle
He won well at Thurles the other day. He’s been left in all three races and I’m sure he’ll run somewhere at Cheltenham. He looks a decent horse by Saint Des Saints.
Leader d’Allier
SkyBet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle/Turners Novices’ Hurdle
He was disappointing at Leopardstown over Christmas [when second to Ballyfad], but his win the other day at Punchestown, even if the race wasn’t as strong as Christmas, the way he ran and finished, puts him right in the Supreme with a chance. He is right in the mix, and he has plenty of experience after six runs on the flat in France.
Love Sign d’Aunou
Weatherbys Champion Bumper
That was a huge performance when he won at Naas on his first start for us last month. I always love horses who can win at those metropolitan tracks at Christmas or this time of year, and do it by more than 10 lengths. That was a deep race too. If you offered the connections of the others €200,000 for any of their horses in the parade ring beforehand, how many would have sold them? Very few. And he didn’t just beat them, he hammered them. That’s a huge run. What I loved about it too is that he never really showed that at home. I love when horses like him do it on the racetrack, because I have so many morning glories who you think are fantastic at home but let you down at the races.
Lossiemouth
Unibet Champion Hurdle/Close Brothers Mares’ Hurdle
She was disappointing in the Irish Champion Hurdle, but it’s a very open Champion Hurdle and I’ll have a good word with Rich Ricci and see what he thinks about it. A lot will depend on how the mare is herself. Definitely the form she was in the other day, I don’t think that would cut the mustard there and she might be better off going for the Mares’ Hurdle in that sort of form, but we’ll see. When you’re weighing up those race decisions in general, you look at all sorts of things. You look at the horses, the riders who might ride, the opposition, and hope you come up with more right decisions than wrong ones.
Majborough
BetMGM Queen Mother Champion Chase
I’m always happy enough with his jumping. He might have had one or two schools [before his win at the Dublin Racing Festival], but very little I’d say. It’s more or less about just getting him right and he’s come right. Mark was happy with him as well.
Mighty Park
SkyBet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle/Turners Novices’ Hurdle
When Mark Walsh got off him after he won at Fairyhouse, he said he looked around at the second last and couldn’t believe how far he was in front, having gone what he thought was a normal slow pace. Mark said his cruising speed must be huge and he’s a fantastic jumper, so I think he must be right in the mix there [in the Supreme conversation].
Your gut tells you he has to be a hell of a horse to do what he did. Listening to Mark, this horse must have huge natural ability. Looking at him, you’d probably say Turners, but listening to Mark and watching what he did on the day… Any horse who can win by 38 lengths, you’re into Faugheen-type territory when you do that. Those things don’t happen very often.
He’s always showed us plenty. I’m always slagging J.P. that he’s running my Champion Bumper horse in a maiden hurdle, and he’d tell me ‘I was thinking of getting a hunters’ chase licence for him!’
To me, from day one, I’ve always thought he was good enough to win a Champion Bumper. That’s the sort of performance he was showing me at home. We knew once we’d gone to Fairyhouse he wasn’t going to run again before Cheltenham. Punchestown would have been too close to run this weekend, for me.
Narciso Has
JCB Triumph Hurdle
A beautiful, big horse who gallops and jumps and he’s a lovely long, tall horse. But I’ll tell you what he has compared to the likes of Majborough and Kaid d’Authie - horses who I think are very similar in being long, narrow and tall - this fellow has got strength. Strength that I don’t see in too many four-year-olds. Apart from his maturity, he’s a strong bugger. He looks a really, really good horse who is still improving. He loves jumping too.
Nick Rockett
Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup
I want to run him in the Gold Cup, but Nick is not the way I want him at the moment, so we’d have to rush him to get there. He still has to be qualified for the Grand National this year too.
Our Trigger
Weatherbys Champion Bumper
He’s only four and, if you go back to statistics, very few four-year-olds win the Cheltenham Bumper nowadays [none since Cue Card in 2010 and Dato Star before that in 1995]. They used to in the early days when they had huge allowances and jockeys could claim. While we take note of those statistics, the difference with a horse like Our Trigger could be that he was probably broken very early and doing a lot of work very early. He’s not like your traditional Derby Sale or Arkle Sale horse gotten ready for that time of his career. I think he’d have a lot of work under his belt, and I’m going to be as interested as anyone to watch what they can do with that preparation, with the allowance for four-year-olds. In recent years, they just haven’t had the strength to go with the older horses.
Poniros
Unibet Champion Hurdle
He’ll definitely run in the Champion Hurdle because there’s nowhere else to run him. The owners are happy enough to let him run there and hopefully he’ll have a first-five finish; I think that’s probably the best we can achieve.
Proactif
SkyBet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle/JCB Triumph Hurdle
J.P. said to make sure to enter him for the Supreme. I always like to have a reserve [for a race like the Triumph where we have the favourite, Narciso Has], but he is in the Supreme and he could look at it that way. I think there’s a huge difference between what my other horses in that race have done and what Proactif has done.
Quiryn
Weatherbys Champion Bumper
Another four-year-old we have in the mix for the Champion Bumper. As I mentioned earlier, four-year-olds haven’t won the race recently but, like Our Trigger, he isn’t a traditional four-year-old store purchase. He came from the flat in France, though he never actually ran in a flat race over there. It will be very interesting to see how the younger horses get on against their elders in the Champion Bumper with that different background to some others who have tried with the age allowance.
Salvator Mundi
Singer Arkle Challenge Trophy Novices’ Chase
After winning at Thurles the other day, you’d be thinking he should go to Cheltenham. However, I think he’s had two disappointing runs at Cheltenham [in the Triumph and the Supreme] and he won at Aintree last year - we were talking about it this morning and that might be the way we’re thinking. We’ll think more about him.
Selma de Vary
JCB Triumph Hurdle
I thought she ran well when second to Narciso Has at the Dublin Racing Festival; her jump at the second last was fantastic. She just got tired. She’s well entitled to run in the Triumph.
Sortudo
SkyBet Supreme Novices’ Hurdle/Turners Novices’ Hurdle/Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle
He won [over two miles at Cork on his seasonal reappearance] and made us think he’s got more speed than we give him credit for, and then he was second over two and a half miles at Naas behind I’ll Sort That when the last two hurdles were missing. Patrick said that, if he’d jumped them, he’d have won it. The others didn’t really follow the winner in front, and tactically it maybe wasn’t all going to plan. However, all credit must go to Declan Queally’s horse - it was a tremendous performance. Maybe Sortudo is an Albert Bartlett horse; I hadn’t really put much thought into where he’s going to run yet.
Spindleberry
Mrs Paddy Power Mares’ Chase/Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup
She has entries at Cheltenham. Whatever connections want to do with her is where we’ll go.