Big Race History: The Cleeve Hurdle

Events / Malcolm Pannett / 21 January 2009 / Leave a Comment

Punchestowns is the hot favourite for this weekend's Cleeve Hurdle at Cheltenham, but who are the famous winners from the past and what might that tell us about Sunday's race. Malcolm Pannett tells all...

The Cleeve Hurdle once provided clues to the Champion Hurdle but has evolved to become a key pointer to the World Hurdle.

The race was first run in 1988 as the Bishops Cleeve Hurdle named after the large village that nestles at the bottom of Cleeve Hill which in turn provides the stunning backdrop to Cheltenham Racecourse.

Cloughtaney, who became a Navan specialist, won the inaugural running by an easy 20 lengths to Mrs Muck and Beech Road, and remains the only Irish-trained winner of the race to date. Paddy Mullins' charge went on to disappoint, on what was probably unsuitably soft ground, in the Champion Hurdle won by Celtic Shot despite being backed into second favourite.

Beech Road famously went novice chasing, had a near death experience, only to revert to hurdling and capture the crown at 50-1 in 1989. He returned to Cheltenham to win the Bishops Cleeve in 1990.

The conditions of the race were gradually altered over the years as was the distance which varied between two-and-a-half miles and two miles five-and-a-half furlongs until 2005.

Crystal Spirit won the first running as a Grade 1 event in 1991 prior to success in the same year's Sun Alliance Hurdle. Muse took the first running with the Bishops prefix removed in 1993; a race marred by the career-, and eventually life-ending, injury sustained by Mighty Mogul.

In 1994 Flakey Dove, in her stellar year, beat Sweet Duke before winning the Champion Hurdle at the expense of Oh So Risky and Large Action. The latter would win the Cleeve in 1997.

The race reverted to Grade 2 status in 2004 and the following year the trip was extended to the current distance of three miles effectively replacing the long distance hurdle that had been run at Haydock on Peter Marsh Chase day.

The credentials as stayers' hurdle trial have been quickly established with the recently-retired Inglis Drever, who finished second to Blazing Bailey in 2007 before winning the World Hurdle, winning both races last season.

10 years ago: Lady Rebecca (pictured) won the race for the first time beating Silver Wedge by 20 lengths. The mare, trained by Venetia Williams, had been a revelation winning ten of her previous 13 races and repaying her small purchase price many times over. She was probably already beaten when making a hash of the last in the Stayers' Hurdle six weeks later eventually finishing third to Anzum.

In the 2000 Cleeve it was Lady Rebecca's turn to benefit from a bad jump as Bacchanal misjudged the last giving the diminutive mare victory by a diminishing neck. Bacchanal took revenge with a vengeance at The Festival taking the stayers' crown in grand style with Lady Rebecca a long way back in a lacklustre seventh. Lady Rebecca returned to Cheltenham for one more day in the sun landing the Cleeve hat-trick in 2001 receiving a rapturous ovation in the unsaddling enclosure.

Five years ago: Alan King won his first Cleeve with Crystal D'Ainay who outsped Hardy Eustace after a slow early gallop. The latter reverted to the minimum trip to win the next two Champion Hurdles while Crystal D'Ainay was not disgraced when finishing a distant third to Iris's Gift and Baracouda in that year's Stayers' Hurdle. Crystal D'Ainay is now plying his trade in long distance chases and cross country events.

Last Year: Inglis Drever had been beaten in the previous year's Cleeve by the Alan King-trained Blazing Bailey, who had been in receipt of 8lb, but reversed the result at level weights in the World Hurdle. In the 2008 Cleeve, Howard Johnson's great champion was kept up to his work through his trademark flat spot to confirm the placings, again at level weights, in what was a prelude to his record breaking third stayers' success.