Cozy Sky leaves herself too much to do at Navan

March 19, 2021

Cheltenham 2021 - Review

The week belongs to Henry De Bromhead, Rachael Blackmore and Jack Kennedy. Minella Indo won the Gold Cup having lost the RSA on the line this time last year. Everyone loves a comeback story and this is one because following that defeat there was a fall at Leopardstown at Christmas and a very ordinary run in February. I thought he was very overrated and even though he fit the age range (the last 3 winners of the race were 7 or 8 years old), I over looked him for Al Boum Photo. Funnily enough it had the feel of when Al Boum Photo won in 2019 because there wasn't a lot of talk about him. I still expected him to be beaten even when he flew the last but A Plus Tard couldn't run him down. He proved me and the doubters wrong today by adding the top prize in National Hunt racing to that narrow second last year and the Albert Bartlett two years ago. What a Cheltenham record! Fantastic for Jack Kennedy as well. He's had some week too - Black Tears beating the hot favourite Concertis

Cozy Sky was bottom weight in a massive field of 18 in a five furlong flat race with Wayne Lordan riding. The Sporting Life racecard highlighted her inability to get out of the gate quickly in her previous races but having finished third on debut for the club, if she could improve her start then surely she could improve on third place. The brief from the yard beforehand was that based on her last run, a top 5 finish was possible.

As the gates opened and the race began, she was last away and in a race as short as five furlong, you're leaving yourself a lot to do. Cozy Sky was struggling to even catch up with the big field never mind getting in the places. She did eventually make her way through part of the field to ensure she didn't finish last but she was about 11 or 12 lengths behind the winner Face Off.

Alex reported that Gordon wasn't happy with her run. She was too keen early on and couldn't finish her race. She's entered again at Fairyhouse this week and hopefully we see some improvement from a horse that looked like she could be the new club star.

Pictures by Pat Vaughan GERC.