16TH Novermber 2024
SUNDAY TIMES
It should mean a lot. A winner at Cheltenham should lift the heart. To ride one should take it higher, higher. To see 18 year old Freddie Gingell’s face after driving Il Ridotto home in the Paddy Power Gold Cup was to see a heart above the clouds.
“It’s days like these you dream of”, he said from the saddle, “he was jumping for fun . I thought I probably got there too soon but Paul (trainer Paul Nicholls) said to kick on no matter what. It’s just amazing.“
The energy bubbled from every word just as it had from the little dynamo behind the mane as Gingell drove Il Ridotto into the lead with a mighty leap at the second last and then pumped like a dervish when the horse nonchalantly cocked his ears on the run-in.
It was third time lucky for Il Ridotto who had been third in the race under Gingell last year and fourth in 2022 under stable jockey Harry Cobden who yesterday rode the 3-1 favourite Ginny’s Destiny for Nicholls who was winning the race on a fourth occasion.
Ginny’s Destiny had raced just behind the leaders and then joined Irish raider Let’s Go Champ at the head of things when Editeur Du Gite caused a spectacular splash at the water jump before weakening dramatically three out to pull up before the next. Once Il Ridotto had soared to the front the main duel was for second with the Lets Go Champ finally being run out of it by the 2022 winner Ga Law..
Il Ridotto is part owned by Sir Alec Ferguson who was in Bahrein yesterday to watch his home bred Spirit Dancer with the £500k International Trophy for the second year running and who also has a share in the 6 year old L’Eau Du Sud who was a thrilling impressive winner of the Paddy Power Arkle Challenge Trophy Trial in only his second run over fences.
“It’s the best squad he has had in years” said the ultra-competitive Nicholl with a smile whose edge belonged to the runaway pace that his former pupil and L’Eau Du Sud’s handler Dan Skelton is setting at the head of the trainer’s table. At almost 90 winners and over a £1m already logged, Skelton has banked twice as much and nearly three times as many winners as his 14 times champion mentor who is only now beginning to get his big guns into battle. Be sure that winning means a lot to Mr Nicholls .
But the day belonged to the young man from Somerset who proudly proclaimed that he “was almost 19” and how he liked to spend his spare time doing “a bit of ploughing” on the family farm. It had been his greatest day. He is a neat size, is very fit, is attached to a massive stable. The prospects are unlimited but to see him smiling, so young and untouched, was to wince at the inevitable knocks and perils ahead he makes his upward climb.
The delight on the teenager’s face also had a poignant echo when we got back to the Press Room and found a bouquet of white roses inside the door. They had been placed there by the son and daughter of the late Alastair Down whose words about the game will last as long as eyes can see and whose name was attached to the room at a ceremony at the last meeting.
Alastair died a week later. The note with the bouquet read :
“ ‘To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.’ Thanks Dad”
Yes, Cheltenham always meant a lot to Alastair Down.