Enigmatic training champ Kevin Myers admits he may not be able to win either Grand National at Riccarton tomorrow but says there is a far greater battle to fight.
Myers is one of New Zealand’s feared trainers and has reps in both the $100,000 Grand National Hurdle (R2) and GN Steeple (R6) tomorrow but they meet some genuine jumping superstars.
He has Run Jakko Run and Obrigado taking on Berry The Cash and Nedwin in the Hurdle and Intellectuals against West Coast in the Steeples as the latter tries to become the first three-time winner of the great race in over 130 years.
“I think mine are just making up the numbers against those horses,” Myers told the Herald.
“Those three are very good jumpers. West Coast is a very good stayer and strong. “You can even see that when he races on the flat, he just keeps going the same speed.
“The Hurdle is a bit more open because Berry The Cash was going to be beaten last week until that other horse [Dictation] dropped his rider but he is still a good jumper.
“But I think Nedwin is probably the one to beat there.”
Myers is an annual supporter of the Grand National meeting and while he has in the past been truculent with the media and racing administrators he says he will be making a submission to New Zealand Thoroughbred Racing about the future of jumps racing after it opened a consultation period on the subject this week.
“I want to ask what they are going to do with all these old horses if there is no jumping for them?” says Myers.
“And I think when they compare the turnover on jumping races they should compare it with other morning races in winter, not some of those races in summer that get a lot more coverage.
“Jumps racing is also important to keep staff in the game and I will be telling them that.”
Myers says he has 20-30 jumpers on his property so he has a vested interest in keeping the code going – but as a NZ Derby-, Auckland Cup- and $1 million Kelt Capital-winning trainer it is hardly like Myers needs jumps racing to survive.
“I think it should be kept going and we should work to get more riders, some from here [NZ] and others from overseas.
“That would help a lot.”
While Myers is realistic about his chances in the two great jumps races tomorrow, he thinks he can win the premier flat race with 2022 New Zealand Cup winner Aljay (R7, No 1).
He was a strong fifth in the Winter Cup last Saturday and should be better up an extra 200m in distance tomorrow, with the 1kg claim of stable apprentice Lily Sutherland a help.
“Lily is riding well and she actually schools some of the jumpers at home too. All our jockeys do.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if she rode over the jumps one day. She is a workaholic, she never stops,” he said of the newly crowned apprentice premiership winner.
The obvious danger to Aljay is Freeze Frame, who stormed home to only just miss in the Winter Cup last week and also claims, with Jim Chung shaving 2kg off his weight.
Two members of the current All Blacks rugby squad are hoping they will have cause for a double celebration this weekend.
Damian McKenzie and Jordie Barrett will be cheering on their promising mare My Chablis at today’s Awapuni meeting ahead of their clash with Argentina in Wellington tomorrow.
The duo share in the ownership of the Stephen Marsh-trained daughter of Burgundy who has made an encouraging start to her career with two wins and a placing from four appearances.
My Chablis will run in the $100,000 Martin Collins Polytrack Innovation Race, in which she will be opposed by stablemate Hasstobefast.
“Both of them are in very good order, they’ve done a treat and it’s nice to have a crack at a $100,000 race,” Marsh said. — LoveRacing.nz.
Michael Guerin wrote his first nationally published racing articles while still in school and started writing about horse racing and the gambling industry for the Herald as a 20-year-old in 1990. He became the Herald’s racing editor in 1995 and covers the world’s biggest horse racing carnivals.