It’s been a while between drinks, but now both horses will run at Listowel this weekend. Freedom to Dream is over hurdles in a 2m 4.5f race at 4.50 tomorrow, and Suprise Package is back from his broken leg and is in the last race on Sunday, a flat race over 1m 5f for amateur riders.
This will be a relatively short blog as, despite the fact that I have lot to fill you in on, I am dog tired after ten days of helping to clear out my mother’s home. She is now in a care home, so we are selling her place, and, to put it mildly, there was a lot of ‘stuff.’ Some stuff is now sitting happily at the town tip (dump to my American friends). Some have been put aside for the world’s largest car boot sale (yard sale), and a couple of items are scheduled to be auctioned in mid-June (two out of the 20 items I took to the auctioneer to be valued is probably par for the course). I flew to Dublin from Birmingham this morning, made a quick detour to the Curragh and yard, and then took an inadvertently circuitous route to Tralee. I was a slave to the navigation, and it decided that L roads were the way to go. If you have never driven in Ireland, you know you’re on an L road if either there is grass growing in the middle of the road or when you come across a car coming in the opposite direction, you both sit there until one of you thinks “ to hell with it, I’m going to drive into the hedge”
I went to the Curragh because Suprise Package was having a quick 6-furlong piece of work instead of the easy swimming session he had scheduled. He looks in great form and not as fat as he was before Leopardstown last year. Curiously, he is nine kilos heavier, so, as I always say to Kim after vacation, it must be muscle. You may have heard the saying, “he will be better for the run,” but he really will be, trust me. That’s not to say he won’t run a good race on Sunday, but the main thing is that he comes out of it well, and we can press on. Everything seems great with him, so there really should be no reason for any concern, but that will not stop us. We have Aine (pronounced onn- ya) O’Connor on him. Aine was the subject of a profile/interview by Patrick Mullins in the Racing Post recently. In that article, she said that she wants to always look her best and wears make-up when she rides. Well, I have news for Aine. Due to some recent skin cancer surgery on my face, I have to wear sunblock and a special cream, so we’ll see who has the most make-up in the parade ring! Aine’s very accomplished, and I am excited about her riding him.
Freedom to Dream is a complete enigma. He has been on holiday since his last race at Naas. Once again, Peter and I were scratching our heads after the race, and we came up with a plan: why not send him down to Wexford and spend a little time with David O’Brien?
David was the Point to Point handler who sold us Suprise Package back in 2020. We have kept in touch over Twitter and WhatsApp and with him training on the beach , we felt a change of scenery might do the horse some good. It’s almost like he was depressed, and because we had no clue what to do with him, there was nothing to be lost in sending him for a few weeks. He seemed to enjoy himself and has been working pretty well. You know, the same as he was working before all of his races. So, your guess is as good as mine as to how he will run. I see he is 33/1 in a few places and that is probably fair based on how he has been running. However, it has been only two years since he finished 4th in the Martin Pipe at Cheltenham off a rating of 135. He has now dropped to 118 and is the complete outsider; can he really have regressed so much? One piece of good news is that Darragh O’Keefe will be riding him. He has had a good time in the Leech silks, having won twice on Suprise Package and was second on the other occasion. He hasn’t ridden Freedom to Dream on the track but did ride him in a schooling race at Tipperary when he performed very well. Delighted to have him riding, and it will be interesting to get his perspective.
At likely odds of 33/1 and 7/1, I may have to have an each way double. My expectations are low so will not be wasting too much money but, if they do run well, it will avoid me looking like a complete idiot.
Hopefully, both horses come back safe and ‘pull out’ without any issues the morning after. They have both had ‘stop/start’ careers, so it would be good to get a clear run. There could be a lot to look forward to, particularly with Suprise Package, so let's hope we’re in a position to do that on Monday morning.