TopSpec Trainer of the Quarter - Tony Martin and Good Time Jonny

Tony Martin and Good Time Jonny

Article by Lissa Oliver

It might be hard for some to choose a single highlight from the Cheltenham Festival, but it was very easy indeed to single out a shrewd training performance by AJ (Tony) Martin, who is our TopSpec Trainer of the Quarter following Good Time Jonny’s fine win in the Pertemps Network Final Handicap Hurdle. Martin mapped a clever campaign to the Final and had the eight-year-old gelding spot-on for the day to secure Martin’s first win at the Festival since 2015.

Based in the tranquil Irish countryside at Trimblestown Stud in Kildalkey, County Meath, Irish handler Martin has the ideal facilities for both Flat and National Hunt horses. A successful amateur jockey in his day, Martin has now been training for over 20 years and has earned a reputation for getting the best out of his horses and for his patience at allowing every horse to progress at their own pace.

Just such a horse is Good Time Jonny, who notched two wins at Leopardstown in the 2021/22 season and promised enough to start in the Gr.1 Albert Bartlett Novices' Hurdle at last year’s Cheltenham Festival before being pulled up in the Gr.1 Novice Hurdle at Punchestown. 

This season, his jumping let him down somewhat when he was tried over fences, although he managed a fourth place in the Beginners’ Chase at Listowel. Having lost his way a little, he bounced back with a qualifying run when third in the Pertemps Network Handicap Hurdle, enough to secure his place at Cheltenham in the Final. In between, he warmed up at Leopardstown, when hampered by a faller.

The ups and downs of jumping stood him in good stead, though. In the Final, Good Time Jonny lost ground at the start, was hampered by a second-flight faller and was just about last turning for home. Under a superb ride from Liam McKenna, he kept persevering and hit the front on the run-in to win, going away by three and a quarter lengths.

Martin was predictably delighted to land another Festival winner. “Days like this are the ones you live for. He was last at the top of the hill but Liam had the patience to sit and wait, and it turned out well," he says. "It’s been a few years now since we had a winner here, but it is worth the agony and the hardship. It’s absolutely brilliant. A bit of a gap makes it better!

“The horse has been coming along really well since Leopardstown last time, I just thought the ground might not suit him—he likes better ground, but he went through it well.

“We had a lot of good years and some bad luck, and it’s nice to be back with some good horses. They are not Gr.1 horses, but in their own category, they are all right. I have some great men, jockeys and staff behind me this year, and I’m just so happy for them. These colours, the Beneficial colours, have given us great days.

Peter Fahey - the Irish racehorse trainer to watch

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THIS ARTICLE FIRST APPEARED IN - EUROPEAN TRAINER - ISSUE 44

Arkle - the legend, Himself

Racing commentator, Sir Peter O'Sullevan called him 'a freak of nature'. Fan mail to him was addressed, 'Himself, Ireland'. 

In March 2014 it will be 50 years since Arkle won his first Cheltenham Gold Cup and this issue features excerpt from Anne Holland's new biography, which tells his story and of the people around the legendary steeplechaser who enabled him to produce his brilliant best.

Racing Against Arkle (From Chapter 8: ENGLAND v IRELAND, MILL HOUSE v ARKLE 1963-64)

Arkle had run six times in his first season, seven in his second and now, 1963-4, was to be the busiest of his career with eight. His reputation was red hot and the whole of Ireland was on fire about him. England was not. They had their own hero, Mill House, the ‘Big Horse’ who as a six-year-old had stormed to Cheltenham Gold Cup glory while Arkle was cruising to a mere novice win at the Festival.

The build up on both sides of the water that autumn was intense. Arkle had become what in today’s parlance is called a ‘Saturday’ horse. Television sets were still few and far between in Ireland and many fans, if they could not get to the track, would flock to whatever friends, relations or pubs had this large, new-fangled, somewhat ‘snowy’ black and white machine taking up a chunk of the sitting room.

At the time Michael Hourigan, now one of Ireland’s leading trainers was an apprentice jockey serving his time with Charlie Weld (father of Dermot) at Rosewell House on the Curragh. It was a strict life but a fair one and the lads found Mrs Gita Weld a perfect mother figure. When Arkle was running the lads were allowed into the house to watch him on the television.

‘I remember the crowds following him in, people were able to get a lot closer to the horses then,’ says Michael Hourigan.

Schoolboy Kevin Colman (now manager of Bellewstown and Laytown races) went to some lengths to reach a television.

‘I got the impression that Arkle ran every Saturday – he wasn’t wrapped in cotton wool. A family friend, Jim Kelly, ran the local athletics club and worked for the Greenshield stamp people including half day Saturdays. My sister Carmel and I were about twelve and fourteen and we used to go in to Dublin with him; his mother lived in Julianstown and on the way back we would watch Arkle on their black and white telly; television was a great novelty then.’

Arkle began his third season by running in a Flat race, against pukka Flat racehorses (unlike his two initial Bumpers which are specifically for NH horses in the making.) Although Arkle had gone through the previous season unbeaten (two hurdles and five chases) he was eligible for the one mile six furlong Donoughmore Maiden Plate because he was, indeed, a maiden on the Flat. There were thirteen runners for the weight for age contest; Arkle had to carry 9 stone 6lb along with three others and the lowest weight was 7 stone 13lb; Arkle was odds-on favourite.

It meant he would have to have a flat race jockey. One of the very best professionals was chosen in Tommy ‘TP’ Burns, who had not only been Champion jockey three times, but who had also grown up with Greenogue very much a part of his childhood.

Speaking in early 2013, just before his eighty-ninth birthday, TP recalled, ‘I spent a lot of my childhood at Tom Dreaper’s and rode a pony around the yard there. He taught me to drive a motor car and he was a friend. My father, Tommy, hunted with the Wards, and used to ride young horses from Tom when cattle were his number one business and the horses were his pleasure.

‘There were some good horses there and they were very carefully trained. They weren’t roughed up and half broken down before reaching maturity; he knew how to mind horses, and they would go on racing until they were twelve years old.’

THERE'S MORE TO READ ONLINE....

THIS ARTICLE FIRST APPEARED IN - EUROPEAN TRAINER - ISSUE 43

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Author: Anne Holland 

Donald McCain - North Star

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(European Trainer - issue 41 - Spring 2013)

Mark Bradstock - a "hands-on" jumps trainer

Completely cleared of giving his stable star King Harald a prohibited substance when the horse failed a dope test after winning at the Cheltenham Festival in 2005, Mark Bradstock is philosophical about his lot It was once said of Linford Christie that he achieved perfect balance over 100 metres on account of having an equally large chip on each shoulder.

Sean Magee (European Trainer - issue 28 - Winter 2009)