Ruby Walsh: Slowing down slowly key to City Of Troy’s Classic fate

However, we are a dot in the Atlantic, a neutral country with no oil reserves, diamond or gold mines, only a good corporation tax rate and the ability to compete in some sports.

We have incredible golfers and Olympic athletes, but we have a soccer team that will never win a World Cup and consider success qualification, and a rugby team that can’t get by a quarter-final on the world stage. Yet by Wednesday, the two generals of horse racing will only consider their return home a success if they have won the Breeders’ Cup Classic and Melbourne Cup.

These are two men who live here, buy the papers in their local shop, employ people in their local area, and run their businesses off this little Island. The horses they have shipped to the other sides of the world were prepared and trained in Tipperary and Carlow.

There’s no chat of the delights about returning home because neither left. Both could have but both chose here, both played local and built from local to compete globally. 

The ambition for both would be where they are, and yes, they did it in different ways, but both prove and show what we have here, what we can achieve from here and what the sport could be here if it’s driven in the right direction.

They are the mascots, ambassadors or poster boys of an industry we should be growing, of a racing product we should be aspiring to make better, of a product we should be trying to get people to come here for. We have always had it, but these two have elevated it and we need to go with them, not against them.

Few people will even know about what both are trying to achieve, but at 9.41 tonight, when the stalls fly open in Del Mar and City Of Troy jumps forward, Willie Mullins will be watching from Melbourne, and millions around the world will be focussed on Ryan Moore.

Johnny Valazquez will boot Fierceness forward from stall nine, Ryusei Saki will drive forward from one on Forever Young, and Luis Saez on Highland Falls from two. Those first three seconds on a dirt track are as crucial as the 100m Olympic final start, and City Of Troy’s fate lies in his ability to break on par.

If he can get himself to the first bend level with his rivals, then the rest is up to Ryan Moore to judge, and faith in Ryan you should have. However, if he is slow into stride, then it’s a miracle from the back of the pack which he will need.

I believe City Of Troy has the athletic ability to run five 24-second quarter miles and 120 seconds will win the race but it’s not that simple. To win the Classic at Del Mar, on dirt, he must run the first quarter in 22.5ish, the second in 23.8ish, the third in 24.05, and the fourth in 24.5.

It’s a long sprint, the 400m equivalent for athletes, but with no lanes, so simple pacing is ruled out because of the kickback off the surface. How much he slows down in the final quarter will determine the result.

HOPEFULLY, when I get to Melbourne, the conspiracy theories surrounding Jan Brueghel’s withdrawal from Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup will have gone to bed. They have done so down there. It is just up here people seem to have concocted some mad notions while choosing to forget what we have had to do at Aintree.

Just like Jockey Club Racecourses with the Grand National, Racing Victoria was pushed into making radical changes a few years back to save the image of its most significant race. Aintree tackled the course, and Racing Victoria scrutinised the participants.

What happened on Thursday will happen again. Jan Brueghel may well be the first high-profile horse the chosen international and independent veterinary panel has not allowed to run. Still, he won’t be the last because the rules are clear for all the runners, and as the saying goes, “doctors differ, patients die”.

It is opinion, at the end of the day, but the requirement to run means any doubt about your physical perfection and you’re out. Simple. No them and us, just no chance taken.

That race, at 4am on Tuesday, won’t be an early rise for me to roar on Vauban and Absurde, but as the sun shines, my body will wonder why it is not dark. I think Willie Mullins could do it, and lessons learned on the other side of the world last year will hopefully pay off. 

Willie has always believed that to win, you must learn from losing, and David Casey was sent south a month ago this time, not seven weeks ago like last year, with the horses. 

Willie went for a day to check in, but the Whatsapp calls from Melbourne are getting brief, which is a good omen for the well-being of the Closutton pair. I hope this year’s flight home is shorter than last year’s.