Robbie Power is no stranger to big-race success. The former Jump jockey has an array of big-race wins on his CV, including Gold Cup and Grand National victories.
However, one of his favourite meetings of the year was always the Galway Festival. The seven-day meeting gets underway at Ballybrit next Monday and despite watching the action out of the saddle this time around, Power, who retired after this year’s Punchestown Festival, is once again looking forward to the meeting which of course features the Galway Hurdle and Galway Plate.
Discussing his memories of riding at the famous meeting, Boylesports ambassador Power said: “Galway has been very lucky for me. I’ve won the Galway Plate and the Galway Hurdle twice. It’s the highlight of the summer with everything from the end of June building up towards Galway. The quality of racing at Galway, particularly on the National Hunt side is massive. The quality of the racing has grown hugely over the last couple of the years and there is a fantastic buzz at the place. It’s a fantastic festival.”
Power will be watching from the stands this year, but he knows what it takes to win the meeting’s two prestigious events having won the Galway Plate on Nearly A Moose in 2003 and the Galway Hurdle above Missunited in 2013 and Tudor City in 2019.
Reflecting on his famous victories at the track, Power continued: “Nearly A Moose won the Galway Plate off 123 and that rating wouldn’t come close to getting into the race nowadays. I think that win in 2003 really helped put me on the map. The Galway Plate is a race we would watch when growing up on TV and it’s such an iconic race. People talk about the Galway Plate the same way they talk about the Irish National. It’s such an important race and to win it was huge. It was massive for me, I was claiming three pounds at the time and it was huge. Nearly A Moose was trained by the late, great Paddy Mullins so it was fantastic for him and it definitely kick started my career.
“When Missunited won the Galway Hurdle in 2013, on declaration day I was actually jocked up to ride another horse who was an outsider. However, my agent rang me and asked if I would rather ride Missunited and I was like definitely as she was around an 8 to 10/1 chance. I’ll never forget that day at Galway. It lashed with rain from the end of racing and it never stopped raining the whole way through Thursday. We thought at one point it would be called off there was that much rain. Every pub and restaurant in Galway city was packed with people who didn’t go to the racing because it was so wet. It was a great reception. Mick Winters the trainer held a party after Galway on the Monday. I was riding at Cork, but then my father drove me on to Kanturk for the party… that was a good night.”
