A Special Breed

Jump jockeys are the most vulnerable of athletes. Everyday familiarity can push that reality to the background sometimes. Often it extends to little more than putting up with flak from jockeys of the grandstand variety. But Robbie McNamara's horrific fall at Wexford on Friday underlined once again just how desperately vulnerable those who participate in the most dangerous sport of all really are. It also underlines how jump riders truly are a special breed.

Physical resilience is a given among them but it is the mental toughness that sets jockeys apart. Boxers, drivers and skiers can reasonably convince themselves they are in some control of the danger simply through being better than their opposition. It doesn't matter how good a jump jockey is: the bald statistics say they will hit the ground on average once in every seven rides. And seventeen per cent of those falls will result in injury. Going out knowing it's a case of 'when' and not 'if' you get seriously hurt is a psychological quandary to warp most minds.

Yet jockeys manage it on a daily basis: and mostly with an understated good humour to boot. It's a marvel of toughness that makes them the most singularly remarkable sportspeople of all. To even consider going at an obstacle at 35mph is enough to make most of us blanch. To do it knowing better than anyone the potential risks involved requires a spirit and toughness that McNamara possesses in spades. What obstacles he faces after spinal surgery are as yet unclear. But what he has on his side is the essential spirit that makes him a jockey in the first place.

In comparison getting excited about betting is completely trivial. But after John F Kennedy's woeful Ballysax Stakes effort, those firms that pushed the former undisputed Derby favourite out just two or three points in the Epsom betting really do look to be taking the proverbial P.

Maybe JFK's performance was all wrong and maybe come the first Saturday in June he will live up to his stratospheric reputation. But there was precious little in his Leopardstown display that could have many arguing if he'd been removed from the Derby betting altogether.

The Galileo colt was hardly fully wound up for his first race of the season but a clearly disappointed Aidan O'Brien said afterwards he felt he had the horse fit enough for such a task. Heavy ground was hardly ideal either but that hardly accounts for such a dismal display either. A vet exam afterwards found nothing which suggests the priority with JFK mightn't be anything physical.

It was noticeable afterwards how the colt left the parade ring trailing another horse carrying a Ballydoyle rug which was described as JFK's "friend." Many good horses have their quirks but plenty disappointing ones do too and it looks like getting JFK's classic season back on track will be quite a test of O'Brien's renowned ability to get inside the equine psyche.

It was certainly a performance to make Ryan Moore wonder whether his 17,000 kilometre trip from Sydney to Dublin was worth the wick and there's little doubt this appears to be one of those seasons when Ballydoyle takes a while to get into top gear.

In contrast Dermot Weld and Pat Smullen have come out firing on all cylinders with Weld winning with a scarcely credible 14 of his 27 runners so far this turf season.

Typically though Weld was ahead of the game after Sunday's Leopardstown maiden where his Zannda edged out O'Brien's Wedding Vow in an exciting finish - "two brilliant jockeys (Smullen and Moore) riding at their very best. They're going to provide plenty entertainment through the year."

Moore's greater presence in Ireland is indeed going to be one of the features of 2015 and the prospect of him regularly competing with Smullen is an intriguing one. Moore is recognised worldwide. How Smullen's services aren't snapped up more for the big occasion has long been a mystery to those who recognise the champion jockey's consistent excellence. Mind you he does have plenty going on at home.

With Free Eagle waiting in the wings for the Tattersalls Gold Cup, Smullen's also looks to have a potential top notch three year old in Zawraq. If there was a potential classic contender on show at Leopardstown it looked to be Zawraq whose performance in winning the Guineas Trial was ultra impressive when you consider everything Weld and Smullen said afterwards indicates they believe him to be more of a Derby horse.

There appeared to be plenty of confidence behind the runner up Endless Drama but ultimately if Zawraq can carry the raw pace he showed over a mile to a mile and a half we could be looking at a proper classic contender.

And now for something completely different, in that there's nothing more removed from classic racing than the Grand National, although that appears to be a distinction lost on Britain's Green Party whose leader has admitted they would consider banning the National and other horse races in the event they form part of the next British government.

Quizzed about the Grand National a day after Many Clouds' victory, Natalie Bennett said there are "animal protection issues there which need to be addressed." Quite what more can be done to address any issues in terms of the National is hard to gauge. This year's race once again escaped welfare headlines while maintaining an enthralling spectacle. But it is disingenuous to suggest the issue of horse fatalities won't return sometime. The idea however that racing as a whole might be targeted in such a way indicates an extremism that will hardly do the Greens any good electorally. It would be interesting to hear what the Greens in Ireland think about this.

As for the actual National itself, it really is a different contest when it can be won by a horse for which Aintree was really a comparative after-thought. In the political climate that exists though, it's important to remember that different doesn't mean the same as wrong.