CAN you believe it? Today, at Naas racecourse, the 2020 flat season officially ends and the various champions will be crowned. Sadly, as with all race meetings at present, and for the foreseeable future, there will be no public present to acclaim the worthy winners. As the meeting clashes with the Breeders’ Cup in the USA, many of the winners themselves will be absent.
After a season to remember Colin Keane will be crowned champion jockey for the second time, having claimed the title in 2017. He does so having ridden 100 winners and these two titles are added to his apprentice jockeys’ championship win in 2014. What a season he had with three Group 1 successes, two classics and perhaps he will add to that tally this weekend.
Gavin Ryan has had a year he will never forget either and two group wins and a couple of listed successes are some of the highlights for the young man who rides as stable jockey to Donnacha O’Brien. He will be at Naas, having ridden yesterday at both the Curragh and Dundalk. I recently had a great chat with Gavin who will follow in some illustrious footsteps when he is acclaimed as the champion apprentice for 2020.
The racing entity of Michael Tabor, Derrick Smith and Sue Magnier occupy the top three slots among the leading owners, with horses carrying Mrs Magnier’s colours earning most money. All three won more than €1 million, while trainer Aidan O’Brien’s runners have amassed more than €4.3 million in yet another fine season.
As Naas draws the curtain down on the turf season in Ireland, manager Eamonn McEvoy and his team can look back on some fine talent they have put through their paces at the Co Kildare venue, affirming their belief that the track lives up to its name of being ‘The Nursery of Champions’. The racecourse’s sales and marketing manager Jackie Donohue said: “Some of the standout horses for us have to be Lucky Vega, Sceptical, Make a Challenge, Miss Amulet, Even So and Chief Little Hawk winning the richest two-year-old race in Ireland this year. I am sure others may wish to add in some of their preferred winners to that list.”
Tally-Ho
Racing TV will broadcast all eight races from Naas today and the card features the Listed Naas Racecourse Business Club Finale Stakes, the Naas November Handicap and the Tally-Ho Stud Irish EBF Birdcatcher Premier Nursery. The latter is one of the most historic races in the Irish calendar and is being sponsored by one of the country’s leading stallion farms, owner by Tony O’Callaghan and his family. This is their second year to sponsor the race.
Following the Birdcatcher is the renamed Mehmas Handicap and this celebrates the exploits of Tally-Ho Stud’s record-breaking first-season stallion.
Second only to his established stud-mate Kodiac as a sire of two-year-old winners, both sires responsible for more than 40 individual juvenile winners in 2020.
The final race of the 2020 turf season pays tribute to one of the course’s great new supporters. Jackie Donohue said: “Tom Stapleton from P&T Stapleton Limited is a Sobac Soil distributor, based in Naas. Sobac Soil sponsored at Naas for the first time on the flat finale day in 2019. From November 2019 to November 2020 Tom will have sponsored seven races between Naas, Fairyhouse, Tramore and Cork. It is fantastic to see a company step up and support Irish racing during this challenging times. Sobac Soil products are used by many racecourse, stud farms and breeders within our industry.”