16 minute read
SONNYBOYLISTON Classic success for the Kildare Racing Club
Sonnyboyliston and Ben Coen win the Comer Group International Irish St. Leger (Group 1) at The Curragh
Kildare Racing Club-owned SONNYBOYLISTON
delivers a knockout punch
ONE OF THE COUNTRY’S OLDEST RACING CLUB’S ACHIEVED CLASSIC SUCCESS LAST SEASON. ITS FOUNDER AND MANAGER LIAM CLARKE CHATS TO BREANDÁN Ó hUALLACHÁIN ABOUT SONNYBOYLISTON’S CAREER TO DATE AND FUTURE PLANS.
Founded over 35 years ago by Liam Clarke and his friend Fran O’Sullivan, Kildare Racing Club had arguably its best season to date last year when Sonnyboyliston took both the Sky Bet Ebor and the Comer Group International Irish St Leger.
Club founder and manager, Liam Clarke, a compiler of pedigrees for over quarter of a century, explains how the club came about:
“Fran O’Sullivan and I compiled all the pedigrees for the sales companies. We bought a horse between us and decided to set up a racing club. We had a bit of luck with the horse and from that we bought another two horses, Music Interpreter and My Alanna. Both were trained by Tony Redmond and won five races each. It just gradually grew from a couple of friends and then a few people further afield wanted to get involved and we’ve kept it going ever since then.”
Kildare Racing Club is different to many other clubs according to its lead man as the number of people involved in each horse is limited and owners “have a proper share.” Unlike major racing clubs in Britain which might have hundreds or thousands of members, Kildare Racing Club operates in a different manner:
“We try to keep it to a maximum of ten people in a horse. Sometimes we might have only four or five who own the horse, but they are all members of the racing club; they’re all separately formed syndicates within the club. A lot of the lads are involved in two or three horses.”
Sonnyboyliston and Ben Coen with groom Pablo Keneebo after winning the Comer Group International Irish St. Leger (Group 1)
When joining any racing club, Liam Clarke believes it’s important to explain to people what’s involved – it isn’t a quick way to make money, as some might think.
“We buy some horses at the sales and we syndicate for the price they’re coming out of the sales. There’s no one making money out of it.
“We have new people wanting to get involved all the time. I get a lot of emails from people who get on to HRI. Word of mouth goes around and that’s how we get our new people each year. I try to get a few new people into some of the horses each year. We’ve people from all over the country – they’re not just local people.”
Obviously due to its high profile successes in recent times, many people enquire about joining Kildare Racing Club. If you are lucky enough to join, what should you expect?
“You have to have an interest to get involved,” Liam says. “If we buy a horse for €20,000, that money is essentially gone straight away. If the horse does something, that’s great, but if you get some money back that’s a bonus. We don’t run a horse for the sake of running him. If we can’t get anywhere after a few runs and being well handicapped, I’d say to the members maybe we should cut our losses and sell him on. People usually agree and say ‘right, we can go again when we find something else,’ the bloodstock agent added.
Sonnyboyliston is Kildare Racing Club’s headline maker at present. The gelding was named after the famous heavyweight boxer Sonny Liston by one of the club members whose father was a boxing fan.
Though the club took Sonnyboyliston to the sales as a yearling, the €35,000 to €40,000 range was not met with a bid, meaning the team bought him back and placed him with trainer Johnny Murtagh.
“We’ve been with Johnny really since he started,” states Clarke. He’s been very fair to us. He’s very straight, he tells it as it is. When I take a horse to him all I ask is that he’s straight with me, whether the horse is good or bad. If he thinks a horse will win, he’s never been very far off the mark, and has mostly been right. I like a trainer to be honest and straight with me.”
As a three-year-old the racing club took the brave step of turning down half a million euro for the son of Power following his win in the Irish Stallion Farms EBF “Northfields” Handicap (Premier Handicap) on Longines Irish Champions Weekend at The Curragh. The logic for refusing such a large sum of money was that some members also owned the dam (Miss Macnamara) and wanted to get black type for the mare.
“We knew barring any accidents he was guaranteed to get black type,” says the bloodstock consultant, “but we certainly didn’t expect him to be a Group 1 winner. We knew he’d get black type – he was listed placed and Group placed but when he won the St Leger it was a huge bonus.”
Last season began with Kildare Racing Club
Kildare Racing Club members in Parade Ring post race
Presentation of the Comer Group International Irish St. Leger (Group 1) won by Sonnyboyliston & Ben Coen
hoping to achieve that much sought-after black type according to Liam Clarke:
“The first thing we had in mind was to get black type. We went to the Ormonde Stakes at Chester earlier in the year to gauge where he stood. We thought it would be a good race to go to and he ran a cracker, finishing third behind two genuine Group 1 horses in Japan and Trueshan. We then knew he was decent. It was a Group 3 and we were delighted we got some small black type. Then we said we wanted to try and win a Stakes race to get large black type. We picked the Listed Limerick race (Martin Moloney Stakes) and really thought he couldn’t be beaten there, and he duly won.”
Liam Clarke had intimated to trainer Johnny Murtagh as far back as September 2020 that he believed the Sky Bet Ebor at York would suit Sonnyboyliston:
“The mare (Miss Macnamara) won over two miles on the flat and two miles one so I felt Sonnyboyliston would stay. She also won two hurdle races over three and three and a quarter miles. Being a pedigree guy – I’ve been doing pedigrees for 25 years – I put it all down to the mare’s side, that’s why the pedigree is done on the female side now. I thought this horse would stay, and he does stay. We picked out the Ebor early in the year. We were confident on the day and before it Johnny more or less said ‘what beats him, will win’ and he didn’t expect him to be out of the first three which was a big call in a race like that. We thought that if he was in the first three or four in the Ebor we might go for the Irish St Leger.”
The 10/1 shot was ultimately a head winner of the Sky Bet Ebor Handicap (Heritage Handicap) at York on 21 August 2020, leaving only weeks to prepare for a tilt at the Comer Group International Irish St Leger.
The tight battle on the Knavesmire took its toll on Sonnyboyliston, however, with Clarke admitting to being surprised when seeing the horse the following day.
“I saw him in Johnny’s the Sunday after the Ebor and I thought he looked a tired horse. He’d lost a bit of weight, of condition, and I saw him the following week and he had his head down. He wasn’t as bright as usual and I thought the Leger might come too soon. In fairness to Johnny, he freshened him up. He had only four weeks and he probably was never as well as the day he won the Irish St Leger – he was in good form.”
Team Sonnyboyliston has an exciting 2022 provisional programme planned out for their star, as Liam Clarke explains:
“We have a race picked in Saudi; it’s a Group 3 over a mile and five. There’s a Group 2 in Dubai at the end of March over a mile and 6 furlongs. They’ll be his two early targets all going well. We’ll have a look after that and might consider something like the Goodwood Cup over a mile and six during the summer. I’d like to think his main target would be the Irish St Leger again; it’s a great race with great prize-money. We think a mile and six is the perfect trip for him but I still think he’ll stay two miles. He has that little bit of toe as well as staying well.”
Turning down that €500,000 offer now seems a smart move by Kildare Racing Club considering that the Sky Bet Ebor victory was worth £300,000 and the win in the Comer Group International Irish St Leger was worth €285,000 to the winner.
“The money we were getting he’s won more than that,” says a delighted Liam Clarke. “By winning the Ebor and the Irish St Leger in the same season made up the money for not selling him. It was a bonus that we got all the black type we wanted, and now he’s a Group 1 winner.”
Would any amount of money now tempt the members of Kildare Racing Club to sell Sonnyboyliston?
“We’d always be open to offers,” concedes the club’s manager, “if a million or a million plus euro came in for him, we certainly would consider it.”
MINELLA INDO
bids for MORE GOLD CUP SUCCESS
BARRY MALONEY ACHIEVED A LIFE’S AMBITION LAST MARCH WITH THE VICTORY OF MINELLA INDO IN THE CHELTENHAM GOLD CUP, THE BUSINESSMAN AND LEADING OWNER SPOKE TO BREANDÁN Ó hUALLACHÁIN ABOUT HIS INVOLVEMENT IN NATIONAL HUNT RACING.
Technology investor Barry Maloney “got the bug” as he describes it from an early age. His interest in racing stems from his father, “a huge National Hunt fan” bringing him to race meetings.
“We’re not really Flat racing people at all. National Hunt has always been our interest. We’ve always focused on it and my Dad was that way, and I guess it’s been that way for all of us ever since.”
His first experience of racehorse ownership came while a student in college. Maloney, a UCD student at the time, was part of a syndicate of around 20 people that won at the Galway Festival.
“We were leasing a horse at the time and it won down in Galway at about 20/1 and the race was on a Thursday or a Friday. I think it was Saturday or Sunday by the time we got back to Dublin. There was a stewards’ inquiry after the race and I remember standing in the ring for about 10 or 15 minutes waiting for the final result and when we got it, the relief was great. I had the buzz then and it has stayed ever since.”
His successful relationship with Knockeen, Co. Waterford trainer Henry de Bromhead goes back to when Henry assisted his late father, Harry, as Barry Maloney explains:
Minella Indo and Jack Kennedy win for owner Barry Maloney and trainer Henry de Bromhead at Cheltenham with groom Cathal Carmody.
“One of the earlier horses we leased at the time was from Henry when he was starting off himself as trainer – in fact he was probably still with his Dad at the time. That was when we really came into contact with each other; it’s that far back.”
That relationship with de Bromhead has continued right up to the present day, with Maloney now having “six or seven with Henry.”
Despite spending much of his time in the US, the former CEO of ESAT Digifone returns to Ireland as often as he can to see his stars running. When we spoke last December, Maloney had been to three Irish race meetings in the space of two weeks.
“I try to get to as many as I can,” he explained. “I’m based in the US a fair amount at the moment so I try and get back. I try to get to as many of them as I can when I’m here.”
His greatest day as an owner came last March at Cheltenham when Minella Indo successfully carried his colours to success in the Gold Cup. Sadly, due to the Covid-19 restrictions in place at the time, the Maloney family was unable to attend in person and instead headed to the family’s hotel, the Mount Falcon Resort near Ballina, from where they watched the race.
When asked how Minella Indo came into his ownership, the Cheltenham Gold Cupwinning owner explains:
“We saw him win that Point-to-Point race (2018 in Dromahane) and that’s what sparked our interest. When we looked at the breeding we quite liked it. We went after him, approached the owner, and were lucky enough to get the deal done, so the rest is history.”
When pressed as to what exactly appealed about Minella Indo, Maloney clarifies:
“He was exactly the type we were looking for – the Gold Cup type. Cheltenham is our Mecca and it always has been. The Gold Cup is the top of that pinnacle, so that is the kind of horse we’re after – a three mile chaser. He just met that profile the way he won that race, the scope of him, the attitude. He ticked an awful lot of boxes for us so when we saw him win the race and got to check out his pedigree and background, we decided to have a go, so that’s how it happened.”
March 2021 wasn’t the first time however that Minella Indo crossed that famous Cheltenham finishing line in front. Previous trips to England had shown that the son of Beat Hollow likes the Gloucestershire circuit. He won the 2019 Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle at 50/1, a win many
Minella Indo and Rachael Blackmore won for owner Barry Maloney (centre) and his brother Mike at Punchestown
described as “a flash in the pan” according to his owner. The following year, he was runner-up to Champ in the RSA Insurance Novices’ Chase.
“He came back to the Irish Daily Mirror Novice Hurdle at Punchestown in 2019 and won the big race there four or five weeks after Cheltenham. He beat Allaho in both the Albert Bartlett (with Allaho third) and at Punchestown (with Allaho runner-up). He’s been a great warrior and we think the best is still to come from him.
“We’ve had a fantastic time at Cheltenham with Minella Indo. He likes it over there – there’s no question but he comes alive. He’s a docile kind of horse and he can be quite lazy and be hard to get fit, as Henry will attest to. We say to Henry our priority is Cheltenham so his whole training regime is fixed on having him in peak fitness for Cheltenham, not October. We build a programme to have him at his maximum fitness in March. He’s good enough to train and he’ll eat you out of house and home if you don’t keep an eye on him. They have a bit of a challenge trying to keep him on the straight and narrow, getting a good balance between his feeding and exercise to get him at that peak fitness.”
Rewinding back to Christmas 2020 though, the signs to the racing public may not have been great ith the much-hyped Minella Indo falling in the Savills Chase at Leopardstown. Though he could only manage fourth next time out in the five-runner Paddy Power Irish Gold Cup back at the South County Dublin venue during the Dublin Racing Festival, his connections didn’t lose hope.
“I suppose we never lost confidence in him last year,” admits Maloney “He fell at Leopardstown at Christmas due to a novice mistake and then he didn’t run great in the Irish Gold Cup in February either. But we never lost faith in what he’d be like when he got to Cheltenham. He just seems to come alive when he gets over there. It was really just to get his jumping confidence back in the Irish Gold Cup. He finished fourth, he was down the field but he got around and that was what we wanted, just to make sure he hadn’t lost any confidence from his earlier fall. Once we got him through that we were fairly confident he would go very close in the Cheltenham Gold Cup. In fact we were a bit bewildered why the market began to lose confidence in him – he was 9/1 at the off. Obviously we thought it was a great price.
“You can never say (you’re going to win a Gold Cup) as it’s such a competitive race,” says Barry Maloney. “There are so many good horses in it, but we felt we had as good a chance as anybody. I remember Henry ringing me that morning saying that he was very happy with him and that he could see even the horse was excited – he gets a little bit of a buzz when he’s over there. Henry could sense that from the horse so we were confident he would run well. In a Gold Cup so many things have to go right for you but thank God they did on the day. “Henry had an unbelievable week but he had a couple of runners in the Gold Cup and we weren’t sure which one was going to be the one, so we were thrilled when it was our one. In fairness to Jack Kennedy he gave him a fantastic ride for someone who had to step in. We were thrilled with the result.”
Now as Minella Indo aims to complete backto-back wins in the Cheltenham showpiece, his proud owner is philosophical about his chances of a repeat victory:
“Very few people do it just the first time. Having won it once, it’s the achievement of a lifetime, so that box is ticked. As the horse is now coming into his peak at nine years of age, how do you follow last year’s Gold Cup win? If the horse is fit and well in March, why wouldn’t we go for it again? As somebody said to me after we won it last year ‘congratulations but there’s only one way you can go from here and that’s down’ and I guess having thought a little about that we said ‘look he’s still young enough so why wouldn’t we be going for it again?’”
