Fathsta goes faster in Sprint Trophy
Picking winners is never easy, even when you have all the information at your fingertips.
Paul Hanagan arrived at York intent on maintaining his lead over Richard Hughes in the jockeys’ championship and he had plenty of firepower to choose from. Perhaps too much.
Richard Fahey, the leading trainer at York this season, was saddling 15 runners on the card which left his stable jockey with some tough choices. The hardest selection was in the Coral Sprint Trophy where Fahey saddled five of the 20 runners. Hanagan chose to ride Irish Heartbeat, who ran a good race to finish third, but he was no match for Fathsta.
The rain-softened ground had meant that many of the races, regardless of the distance, had unfolded down the stands’ rail in the home straight. But this time the field kept towards the centre of the track as Brae Hill, another of Fahey’s runners, led. There was at least half a dozen in with a chance with a quarter-mile to run, which included Irish Hearbeat, but that changed once Silvestre de Sousa kicked Fathsta clear near the furlong pole as he came three-and-a-quarter lengths clear of the fast-finishing Damien.
This was the 90th winner of the year for De Sousa, the former champion apprentice of Brazil, who said: “He was enjoying the ground, he travelled easy all through the race and did it in great style.”
Fathsta’s trainer, David Simcock, is finishing the season in great style – mainly with star two-year-old Dream Ahead - but the man whose dreams came true in real style was owner-trainer John Grogan. The cattle farmer from Cashel, Co Tipperary, has only the one horse but she is a pretty useful one because Katla was the runaway winner of the Listed Coral Rockingham Stakes.
Easy Ticket had just got the better of Murbeh but was swept aside as Katla came past to win by six lengths to the disbelief of much of the crowd – and the trainer. “I can’t believe it – I can’t believe it,” Grogan said. “We didn’t think she’d do this – we were coming for place money. I’ve got the one horse. Muck out, drive the box – the lot.”
Most horses in Ireland are for sale at the right price but it may take quite a price for Grogan to part with this filly. “She’s tying with my wife at the moment,”
Hopefully Mrs Grogan is not going anywhere nor winning rider Billy Lee who kept his cool when he suddenly realised that he was chasing more than place money. “She travelled fierce good. I just took her back early because they were going nice gallop. But, halfway, she just pulled me up to nearly lead. I thought I got there a little soon but she kept going away to the line.”
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