- Four-year-old Sir Gino won Saturday’s Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle
- Nicky Henderson described Sir Gino’s jumping as ‘absolutely breathtaking’
Another headache for Nicky Henderson but, after two weeks of turbulence, this one was welcome — when brilliance introduces itself, there can never be reason to complain.
Henderson was here at Newbury on Saturday, for Coral Gold Cup day, but was understandably distracted by events 300 miles away in Newcastle.
Plenty was riding on how Sir Gino fared in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle and the trainer’s puff of the cheeks as his horse crossed the line in splendid isolation spoke volumes.
With the greatest respect to Paul Nicholls, who meticulously prepared Kandoo Kid to become his first winner of Newbury’s great race since the mighty Denman in 2009, Sir Gino provided the display that made us all go ‘wow’ and showed why Henderson’s faith in him has been unshakeable.
Sir Gino had been the companion of Constitution Hill 12 days ago for the gallop that ended with his illustrious stablemate pulling up lame.
Henderson ended up in the firing line, with many sceptical about whether the 2023 Champion Hurdler will return, but that piece of work now looks different.
Jockey Nico de Boinville won Saturday’s Fighting Fifth Hurdle at Newcastle aboard Sir Gino
Trainer Nicky Henderson was at Newbury on Saturday but he was watching Sir Gino from afar
It is so different, in fact, that it prompted Henderson to mention Sir Gino — a four-year-old who has been on a racecourse in Britain just four times — alongside some of his recent greats.
No matter that Mystical Power, the other 6-5 joint favourite, failed to fire, this was something thrilling.
‘We haven’t pretended that we believe he is very, very good,’ said Henderson, who watched the race on Newbury’s big screen and was clearly emotional after Sir Gino put eight easy lengths between himself and the runner-up Lump Sum.
‘He throws the conundrum at us now: “what do we do next?” If you see this horse jump a fence, he is absolutely breathtaking. Let’s just see. When they are special, like Sprinter Sacre and Altior were, nothing other than a really dominant performance will satisfy you. So, yeah, he’s as good as thought.’
This was the highlight of an across-the-card treble for Henderson, featuring Wiseguy and Impose Toi. He went home happy, for sure, but so did his old sparring partner Nicholls, who hollered Kandoo Kid up the run-in as he won the contest known to many as The Hennessy again.
Nicholls had won it twice as jockey in the mid-1980s and three times previously as trainer but this gave him a real kick, not least because he had £100 each-way ante-post at 25-1 on Harry Cobden’s mount, who returned at 8-1.
‘I just love targeting horses at races and I knew he’d run well,’ Nicholls said. ‘I would love to run him in the Grand National at Aintree, I think it would really suit him.’
Jack Kennedy suffered the latest desperate blow of his career when he broke his leg for the SIXTH time after a horrific fall at Fairyhouse in which his horse Twoohthree died.
