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Successes for jumps yards in the Northumberland Plate
With favourite Trueshan bidding to win Alan King his second Northumberland Plate in three years, Timeform’s John Ingles looks at the past successes of jumping stables in one of the season’s big Flat handicaps.
When Who Dares Wins won the 2019 Northumberland Plate, Alan King added his name to the list of trainers best known for winning jumping’s major prizes to have landed one of the Flat season’s biggest staying handicaps. The majority of King’s winners during his career have come over jumps, 15 of them at the Cheltenham Festival, though perhaps ‘dual-purpose’ might be a better description of the trainer’s operation nowadays and the direction in which it is going.
After all, this time last year, Who Dares Wins had just provided Barbury Castle with its third winner of the week at Royal Ascot when successful in the Queen Alexandra Stakes. Later in what proved King’s most successful Flat campaign to date, the trainer enjoyed his biggest win on the level when Trueshan won the Long Distance Cup on Champions Day.
Trueshan’s high-class performance at Ascot has earned him the burden of 10-4 (minus apprentice Rhys Clutterbuck’s 5 lb allowance) in Saturday’s Northumberland Plate where he and stablemate Rainbow Dreamer will bid for what would be their stable’s second win in the race since Newcastle replaced its turf course with the all-weather Tapeta surface for Flat racing.
Martin Pipe won two Northumberland Plates in the 1990s, the first of them with Tamarpour 30 years ago. Tamarpour’s weight assignment could hardly have been more different from Trueshan’s. Running from 7 lb out of the handicap with just 7-7 on his back (effectively from an official mark of just 69 – he wouldn’t even get into the consolation race these days!), Tamarpour was the final big-race winner in the career of his jockey Ernie Johnson, best known for winning the Derby on Blakeney in 1969. Tamarpour, whom Pipe had picked up out of a claimer – he had begun his career with Luca Cumani when owned by the Aga Khan – was still a maiden on the Flat when he lined up for the 1991 Northumberland Plate.
Even though his biggest career win came on the Flat, Tamarpour was actually a better horse over hurdles, proving useful in that sphere, and had run up a hat-trick at Wincanton, Newton Abbot and Uttoxeter earlier in the year. Tamapour started favourite for the Cesarewitch later in the season, with Lester Piggott in the saddle, but his only subsequent success under Rules came on the Flat at Chepstow four years later after a lengthy absence in the interim. He ended his career running in points, recording another win, and made his final appearance under a teenage Tom Scudamore whose father Peter had ridden him to his three wins over hurdles.
Eight years after Tamarpour, Pipe won his second Northumberland Plate with a much more talented performer – certainly on the Flat – Far Cry. He was already a prolific winner on the all-weather for Sir Mark Prescott when Pipe got hold of him and he continued his progress for his new yard. In fact, he won just five days after changing stables, landing the Queen’s Prize at Kempton, another staying handicap with a long tradition that has since become an all-weather contest.
Sent off joint favourite at Newcastle, Far Cry came out on top by just a short head under Kevin Darley after a memorable tussle with the other market leader Travelmate. Like Tamarpour, Far Cry was a beaten favourite for the Cesarewitch later in the year, but by then he had already proved himself outside handicap company, recording another game and close-fought victory in the Doncaster Cup with another former Northumberland Plate winner, Celeric, back in third.
After an impressive win on his hurdling debut at Newbury later that autumn and then running Relkeel to a neck in the Bula Hurdle, Far Cry briefly looked a Champion Hurdle contender but his jumping technique wasn’t without its flaws and he ran his best races back on the Flat in top staying company. He showed smart form in finishing runner-up in both the Gold Cup and the Goodwood Cup, and even though he passed the post a head behind Kayf Tara at Royal Ascot many expected the placings to be revised after the Godolphin horse had given Far Cry a slight bump and leant on him in the closing stages (the result was upheld). Those efforts earned Far Cry joint top-weight in the Melbourne Cup in which he sustained a career-ending leg injury.
Philip Hobbs was the next jumps trainer to win the Northumberland Plate, he too doing so with a former Sir Mark Prescott inmate, Unleash, in 2003. Mirjan caused a 33/1 upset for Len Lungo a year later – the eight-year-old, a former Swinton Hurdle winner for his jumping yard, was having just his second start on the Flat since his three-year-old days – he was another recruit from Cumani and the Aga Khan. Tony Martin launched a successful raid from Ireland in 2008 with the lightly-weighted Arc Bleu, while the last jumping trainer before Alan King to win the Northumberland Plate was Jonjo O’Neill whose Tominator carried top weight to victory in 2013 – Tominator had also won the race two years earlier when trained by Reg Hollinshead.
But the most successful jumps trainer in the Northumberland Plate since Martin Pipe is Donald McCain who won with Overturn in 2010 and Ile de Re two years later. The mud-loving Ile de Re had his ideal conditions when winning a heavy-ground Northumberland Plate, a victory which followed his beating of Overturn into second in the Chester Cup. That was a career-best effort on the Flat from Overturn under 9-10 in his bid to win the Chester Cup for the second year running.
His first major success on the Flat had been his Northumberland Plate victory which was also his first Flat start for McCain. He had begun his career with Walter Swinburn and had just completed a successful first campaign over hurdles for McCain, winning the Scottish Champion Hurdle and finishing second in the Swinton, before going to Newcastle. Overturn’s usual front-running tactics served him particularly well on this occasion as it was a rough race for some of those behind.
Overturn’s successful career under both codes made him arguably the best dual-purpose horse since dual Champion Hurdle winner Sea Pigeon who was himself second in the 1977 Northumberland Plate. Apart form being smart on the Flat, Overturn made into a high-class hurdler, winning the Fighting Fifth back at Newcastle and finishing second in the 2012 Champion Hurdle, and proved almost as good in novice chases the following season.