Il Etait Temps on his way to Queen Mother Champion Chase glory (Picture: Sky Sports Racing)
The BetMGM Queen Mother Champion Chase over two miles is one of the four premier Championship Gr 1 events at the Cheltenham Festival and in Wednesday’s renewal of this iconic event the winner was the Hollywood Racing and Barnane Stud-owned Willie Mullins-trained French-bred Il Etait Temps.
The Cheltenham Festival is considered by many to be the greatest horseracing event in the world such is the prestige attached to every one of the 28 races, especially to any of the four premier Gr 1 Championship Events.
It was therefore a milestone moment for the South African owners, the Heffer family of Hollywood Racing and the Kieswetter family of Barnane Stud.
The win gave Willie Mullins a 118th Cheltenham Festival victory, which is a record by a long way, and Paul Townend a 41st Chleltenham Festival win.
Il Etait Temps was eased back by Townend when it seemed the furious pace being set up front by stablemate and odds-on favourite Majborough was just a tad too hot.
This proved to be a wise decision, because although it initially looked like he was not traveling well and had thus dropped back, the picture changed completely after Majborough had blundered coming down the hill towards the straight.
It soon became clear that those who had chased Majborough did not have nearly as much left in the tank as Il Etait Temps had and he actually took the lead with still two jumps ahead of them in the straight.
He just had to clear them to win as it became apparent that of the main protagonists he was the only one who had enough left to gallop up the fearsome Cheltenham hill at a winning speed.
There was a horrible moment for the connections when he landed awkwardly after jumping the last and went down onto a knee.
He recovered and the momentum it caused him to temporarily lose was not significant because he was well clear and no other horses were running on strongly enough to take advantage of it.
He had soon recovered his finishing speed too and galloped to a ten length victory from 50/1 outsider Libberty Hunter with L’eau Du Sud next best.
Il Etait Temps had thus completed a remarkable comeback from a heavy fall at Sandown in the Gr 1 Clarence House Chase at Ascot on January 17.
The yard had to do plenty of work on him to get him back to his peak.
Il Etait Temps is now a seven-time Gr 1 winner, one of them over hurdles and six chases.
He is not he biggest of horses, but makes up for it with immense courage and he invariably does his best work in the finish.
This was his fourth visit to Cheltenham. which was not considered his happy hunting ground as his first three visits had yielded two fifths and a third. In fact since his maiden win his two fifths and his third at Cheltenham and his fall last time out at Ascot were the only times in 15 starts he had not finished in the first two.
Lesley Heffer received the trophy on behalf of all the owners from the patron of the event, Queen Camilla.
Owen and Devin Heffer as well as Wayne, Belinda and Craig Kieswetter and also the Barnane Stud team of Patrick and Topsy Wynn Jones were all there to witness the spectacular victory.
Craig Kieswetter was interviewed and admitted he was pretty speechless with emotion. The reality of owning a Cheltenham Festival Championship race winner was probably still sinking in!
Mullins was full of praise for the horse and for Townend.
He spoke about the latter’s “clock” in his head and said when he saw Townend dropping back he knew they were going too fast.
Townend’s pace judgement was the key to the victory.
