Willie Buckley remembered via race named in his honour at Dundalk Stadium

It was a night that once again remembered and paid tribute to Willie Buckley, who sadly died after falling ill whilst working at Dundalk on March 1st in 2019.

For 11 years, Willie had worked for the security department of the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board. Hugely popular and greatly respected, his passing is still keenly felt. Ample evidence of this was provided when a large contingent of family and friends gathered at the Stadium to celebrate his life and memory.

Willie’s son, Tony, and daughter, Sinead, and their spouses Gina and Pat were there, as were his brother Denis, his sister Mary, granddaughters Nessa and Abbey, and many more, many of whom assembled on the podium to present the winner’s trophy to the Harmony Partnership following the Willie Buckley Memorial Handicap, the card’s feature race, and to be present for the photo-call.

The race itself produced a thriller, with the diminutive mare Harmony Rose (8/1) sticking her neck out gamely to withstand the challenges of Tai Sing Yeh and Primo Uomo by, appropriately, a neck and a short head.

Trained in County Kildare by Ken Condon, she was ridden to victory by Billy Lee, who said, “She has a big heart and she tries.”

This win took Billy onto seven winners for the year at Dundalk, a total equalled only by apprentice Jack Kearney, who again advertised his skills in riding Maid To Shine (10/1) to victory in the card’s seven-furlong maiden.

Owned and trained by Paddy Hassett, Maid To Shine was led in by his son Garrett, whose partner is the daughter of Luke and Bernie McAteer (who jointly led in the filly), who were involved in breeding the winner and were also on hand to celebrate this victory, making it quite a family affair.

Moving onto 10 Dundalk winners this year was trainer Joseph O’Brien when Okita Soushi (8/15 fav) landed the card’s finale by a hard-fought half-a-length from stable-companion San Andreas.

Ridden by Mikey Sheehy, the winner is owned by Toshihiro Matsumoto and was following up his Dundalk success on February 10th, which came over two miles. This trip was 10 furlongs and 150 yards, so the winner certainly is versatile.

Up onto seven winners at Dundalk this year was Ado McGuinness when Miss Caruso (9/2) gained a first career success in landing the Irish Stallion Farms EBF Maiden. It was just a third run for the daughter of Sioux Nation who cost connections £50,000 as a yearling.

Their investment has been rewarded as the terrain changes markedly for fillies once they win a race, in terms of breeding and potential sale value. Guiding her to victory was Ronan Whelan.

The winning owners were Shamrock Thoroughbreds – who were enjoying a thirteenth winner with Ado in the last couple of years or so according to delighted syndicate member David Hennessy – and Alex Zevenbergen.

The card had started with a gamble being landed in the Irishinjuredjockeys.com Claimer on Jaafel, who was backed from 11/2 into 2/1 before winning quite cosily under a well-judged ride from Daniel King.

Daniel and winning trainer Denis Hogan came close to landing a double when Ransom, who was bidding for a third-successive Dundalk win, was edged out by Mulgrave (9/2), who succeeded in securing a third-straight win at the Stadium, in the Crowne Plaza Hotel Dundalk Race and Stay Handicap.

The John McConnell-trained gelding is clearly on the upgrade and could be heading for the valuable All-Weather Championships meeting at Lingfield Park in England in April.

Securing back-to-back successes at Dundalk was the Anthony McCann-trained Circles (10/3 fav), who confirmed her progressive profile in landing the Book Online at DundalkStadium.com Handicap by a hard-fought head under Seamie Heffernan.

Anthony, who is based in Castleblaney, County Monaghan, said afterwards: “The first night Seamie rode her he said he was sorry that he didn’t win, but he promised that, after Christmas, she would win one or two.”

It will come as no surprise to anyone that Seamie’s judgement has been vindicated.

Much as he had won three times in France between March and May 2022, Deluca Chop hadn’t shown too much since arriving in Ireland in August of the same year.

However, that all ended on Friday night, when on his second run for Ger O’Leary he arrived late on the scene to land the apprentice handicap under Dean Curran at odds of 14/1.

The win, though, was laced with poignancy as the winning trainer announced his retirement immediately after the race. Clearly emotional, he declined to discuss his future plans, but the winning jockey said, “Ger and Adrian (Ger’s assistant, Adrian Joyce) have been very good to me and I can’t thank them enough.”

Dundalk will race again on Friday March 3rd, which is the ‘European Road To The Kentucky Derby’ fixture, one of the Stadium’s most-prestigious meetings.

The Patton Stakes, a Listed race worth €40,000, is effectively a qualifier for the famous ‘Run For The Roses’ at Churchill Downs in Kentucky, which this year will be run on Saturday May 6th.

It promises to be an exciting and classy centrepiece of another night of racing at the Stadium. The first race is due off at 4.55pm.