Katie Walsh has grand designs after Cheltenham success

It’s as well phones are of the mobile kind these days, otherwise the chances of tracking down Katie Walsh this week would have been around 1,000-1.

“I’m in Doncaster now, heading home tonight, then back over for Aintree, home again . . . it’s that time of year,” she laughs, life being led out of a suitcase this weather. “Dublin airport don’t know what I’m at, I’m probably lucky to get through passport control at this stage.”

The schedule is, then, jammed, and not just on the jockeying front, the 33-year-old busy with breeze-up sales, the latest necessitating that Doncaster trip. That followed one the week before in Ascot, and there are two more in Newmarket at the beginning of May. It doesn’t end there, either.

It’s another side to the horse-racing business for Walsh who buys promising foals or yearlings and then sells them on as two-year-olds at breeze-ups where she rides them over short distances to allow potential buyers judge their performances.

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But she is, of course, better known to us as a jockey, and March provided another memorable moment in her career when she rode her third Cheltenham winner, this time on 25-1 outsider Relegate when she came from the back of the field to win the Champion Bumper. And no one was more surprised than Relegate’s trainer Willie Mullins who reckoned the horse “was going to be an also ran”.

“I was a long time waiting for the third, I hit the crossbar a couple of times, but I got there in the end,” says Walsh, her previous winners both coming at the 2010 festival, on Poker De Sivola in the National Hunt Chase and Thousand Stars in the County Handicap Hurdle.

Emotions

“Emotions were high,” she says of her reaction after the race when her mind was still on her brother Ruby’s fall earlier in the day when he fractured his leg, having just returned from a similar injury.

“It just shows what an up and down game it is, it was a great day for me on a personal level, but a terrible one for Ruby, so I was definitely torn and emotional about it. I knew by then that he was okay, which is all that mattered, he was talking to us behind the screens. But I just felt so sorry for him. We’re a close family, which is something I really appreciate, not everyone is that lucky. We all look out for each other.”

With Ruby ruled out of Aintree, it’s his sister who will be flying the Walsh family flag in the Grand National on Saturday when she will ride Baie Des Iles – trained by her husband, Ross O’Sullivan.

Is the National the sole topic of conversation over breakfast these days?

“Ah well, our conversation doesn’t go too far beyond horses on any day,” she laughs, “they’re our lives.”

This will be her fifth ride in the National, the high point coming in 2012 when she came third on Seabass, trained by Ted, her father. It remains the highest ever finish by a female jockey in the race.

Can Baie Des Iles go two better?

National trial

“Well, she definitely fits the bill, she’s a lovely mare. She had a great run when she finished third at the National trial at Punchestown in February, she’s a good jumper, and the soft ground should suit her. You feel like you have a chance alright, but as we all know with the National, you need a lot of luck. I’m just mad looking forward to it now, it’s always a thrill to ride in the race, I’m just excited about it. Can’t wait.”

Alongside compatriot Rachel Blackmore (on Alpha des Obeaux) and English woman Bryony Frost (on Milansbar), Walsh will be one of three female jockeys in this year’s race. Should she go two better than 2012, Baie Des Iles would become the first mare to win the National since Nickel Coin in 1951, Walsh, who became the third woman to win the Irish Grand National back in 2015, would, of course, make her own slice of history and, by extension, be part of the first husband-wife pairing ever to triumph in the race.

Is Ross a hard taskmaster?

“Ah no, he’s extremely easy,” she says. “It’s all just good fun, that’s how we look at it, we’re very lucky to have this chance together. All he wants is for both of us to come back in one piece, safe and sound. And that’s all you can hope for. Beyond that, it’s in the lap of the Gods.”

Previous monthly winners (awards run from December 2017 to November 2018, inclusive):

December: Fiona McHale (Gaelic football). McHale was the driving force behind Carnacon's victory over Mourneabbey in the All Ireland Club final, the Mayo midfielder earning the Player of the Match award for her performance in a 0-15 to 1-10 win at Parnell Park.

January: Phil Healy (Athletics). The Cork woman had an encouraging start to the indoor season when she knocked over a second off her 400 metres personal best by running 52.08 at a meeting in Vienna in what was her first race of the year. Her performance earned her European Athletics' "Female Athlete of the Month" award.

February: Cora Staunton (Australian Rules). Her Australian Football League adventure might not have ended as she would have hoped, the Greater Western Sydney Giants just missing out on a place in the Grand Final, but Staunton still made a major impact during the season in a sport she had only taken up months before. Mayo would quite like her back now.