Denis Hogan

It is all systems go for Make A Challenge to have a go at Group 1 honours in the Qipco British Champion Sprint at Ascot tomorrow. The 40 grand supplementary fee has been paid up so we kind of have to go now!

It was always something I was thinking about. To be honest, he was so good in the Joe McGrath, the Prix de l’Abbaye was in the back of my head. I thought maybe it was crazy money. That was 27! So I thought, ‘Let’s go to listed company first and see can he do the same.’ I thought he could too. And he was so impressive.

So you look at the conditions of the ground and the race cutting up after a long season. A few bombed out in Longchamp. I thought after the Waterford Testimonial Stakes, if he was okay on Monday morning he has earned his ticket.

He is ready to race. We would have loved another week but we don’t kill him galloping at home. We keep him fresh from race to race. He seems well. Hopefully he’ll have luck in running and break well which is important in sprints.

Joe Doyle will ride. He knows him well and he has been here all year. He has worked hard. He deserves a chance. I rate him as good as any of them out there.

He rode his first winner for me on my first real good horse, Inis Meain in Leopardstown seven years ago. Then he moved to the UK and worked out his claim. He took a year away from racing. He landed back here this year and took out his licence in June and has ridden a good few winners since. He is a local fella in Cloughjordan as well. He is in here every day. Having him involved has added to this whole experience with Make A Challenge.

It was November last year when Make A Challenge made his debut. We thought he was okay. He would win at a level if it was organised right. We sent him to Dundalk and he ran mid-division first time. Then a mile-and-a-quarter was too far. On his third start he showed a bit when third but he wasn’t a fan of the all-weather.

We put him away for the winter after he finished fourth on his fourth run and I got him back and I sold a half-share in him. He actually let me down the first two days, he didn’t load. Then the third day he did load eventually in Limerick but when he came out he must have been half a furlong behind. He actually caught up with them at the top of the hill. A lot of people didn’t notice it but that was probably his best performance. He probably ran a stone above his rating doing that over that trip. We did a good bit of work on the stalls before Killarney but he was a bit keen and we made too much use of him when he was second. He won his maiden in Fairyhouse in May and has now won six times. It all worked out well for us because he got into the races in Galway and doubled up there.

The work our staff and stall handlers have done with him has been the making of him. They let him go down early and he’s been brilliant.

We picked him up for £6,500 from Godolphin two years ago. I do take a chance on types like that. They’re so well bred but they just need a bit of time. When you have numbers, you can’t be giving every horse time but we put him away for a year really to let him develop a bit. When you have breeding like that and Invincible Spirit is doing well, it will often come through eventually.

We’ve had three very good sprinters. Tithonus was four grand. He won a Rockingham and a Scurry but unfortunately died with a foot infection. He could have been very good. This year, Hathiq has won three times and he only cost three grand in January. He’s had a few issues that we’ve ironed out for the winter, we think. And now Make A Challenge and he was the most expensive at six grand.

If he was to win, it’d be dream stuff. But he’s there and he deserves to be there and I think he’s definitely better with an ease, with soft ground. His only time beaten in his last seven runs was on quick ground on Champions Weekend. And at that, he finished upsides Gulliver, who won the York Sprint last weekend.

We probably have as many flat horses and summer jumpers now as winter horses, but we have a select few. I have a nice bunch of three-year-olds that obviously won’t come to hand for six months or a year.

We have the two good mares. Moyhenna will probably be targeted at the Irish National and her sister Moscovite will be in all those mares’ novice chases. Bua Boy will be a nice novice hurdler. Doyen Dancer is another. Macgiloney will probably go chasing in the spring. There’s a couple of nice ones there and with 18 winners already, we’re only two off last year’s tally and three off our best of the season before, so we can’t complain. And we’re already on 28 for the whole year on the flat, compared to our previous best of 17 before. So things are going well.

If Make A Challenge were to do the business, and he has to have a chance, it would be incredible.