Papillon victory could hardly have been scripted better for Walsh

It has been 25 years since Papillon won the Randox Grand National Papillon won the Randox Grand National – and trainer Ted Walsh still remembers that day as if it was yesterday.

Papillon gave the Walsh family their greatest day on the racecourse when after being heavily backed from 33-1 to 10-1 he came home in the hands of son Ruby – riding in the great race for the first time – to beat Mely Moss by one and a quarter lengths.

But it could have been a totally different story, as Papillon’s owner Betty Moran was reluctant to run him over the famous fences at Aintree and took a lot of convincing.

On top of that Ruby Walsh suffered a broken leg when falling from Shannon Fountain in one of the supporting races at the Pardubice meeting in the Czech Republic and only returned to race-riding weeks before the National.

It was the second consecutive father-and-son success story from Ireland, after the Tommy Carberry-trained Bobbyjo was steered to glory by Paul Carberry.

Bobbyjo had only just touched off Papillon in the 1998 Irish Grand National and that gave Ted Walsh all the confidence he needed to try his luck in the big one.

He said: “I can remember plenty about that day. I can remember every single detail. The same as if it happened yesterday.

“I would have been a very proud father if Ruby had ridden the winner of the National for anybody else, but the fact he was riding it for me made it double delight.

“(Children) Ted and Katie led him up, (wife) Helen was there as well and all my family and friends were there.

“It couldn’t have happened on a better day and the woman who owned him, I always treated her as if she was my fairy godmother. She was a friend of my father’s and she was very good.

“She bought Papillon for Ruby to ride him. She took a little bit of convincing to run him in the National because she had bad reports of the National as a dangerous race both for the jockey and the horse, but when she got that out of her system it was all systems go.

“We really only went with a good shout and it turned out to be definitely the best day of my life racing, anyway.

“It was Ruby’s first ride in the race, it was not my first runner. I’d had Rock De Prince before that (finished 17th in 1992), but it was basically that we hadn’t a great record in the race, the Irish, until Bobbyjo won it the previous year.

“The fact he won it gave us a bit of heart, we’d been second to him in the Irish National the previous year and that gave us a bit of heart to go there.

“All the cards fell in the right place because Ruby had got badly injured in the Czech Republic in October and he’d been out for five or six months.

“If he’d been back riding, he was riding for Willie (Mullins) at the time, maybe not first jockey, but Jason Titley had ridden Micko’s Dream to win the Thyestes Chase and he was heading to the National and maybe if Ruby hadn’t have been injured (for the Thyestes), he might have ridden Micko’s Dream.

“If he’d ridden him for Willie he might have run in the National and I might never have run Papillon. There’s a lot of ifs and buts.

“He was bought from the sales at Doncaster as an unbroken four-year-old and we had him until he closed his eyes, we closed his eyes for him, when he was nearly 30 years of age.

“He was around the place for a long time and his remains are still buried in the place. So he’s very much part of our history. Young Ted named him after the film Papillon, with Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman. It was a great name for a horse.”

Walsh also enjoyed family success with his daughter Katie, who become the first female rider to be placed when guiding Seabass to third in 2012 behind Neptune Collonges.

Walsh added: “It probably could have equalled Papillon if he’d won. She would have been the first lady ever to win the National, she was the first lady to be placed in the National and it was a great thing.

“Seabass was around a long time as well, ever since he was a four-year-old, and he was with us until he finished his days.”

Much has changed about the National in recent years, but Walsh – who also twice went close with Any Second Now – believes its magic still endures.

“Everything about Aintree was so special. I’d been going there from a very early age, going over on the boat to watch the National,” he said.

“It was part of just what you were reared up to be. The English National was the most famous race in the world and probably still is the most famous horse race even after all the adjustments. It still manages to capture.”