Hurricane Fly: Remembering One of National Hunt Racing’s Greatest Champions

The death of Hurricane Fly at the age of 22 has taken from National Hunt racing a horse whose career belongs among the finest the sport has seen. The sadness surrounding his passing is about considerably more than the 22 Grade One victories, two Champion Hurdles or the extraordinary sequence of victories he accumulated during seven seasons with Willie Mullins.

For a generation of racing followers, Hurricane Fly became part of the rhythm of the jumps season. When winter arrived, so did The Fly. Leopardstown at Christmas, the Irish Champion Hurdle, Cheltenham in March and Punchestown in the spring became familiar stages for a horse who remained at the highest level for so long that several generations of potential rivals came and went while he was still there.

Hurricane Fly died at the Irish National Stud, where he had lived since his retirement in 2015. It was a fitting place for him to spend his final years. He shared his retirement with other great National Hunt names including Faugheen, Hardy Eustace and Beef Or Salmon, and it was also where his life had begun. Bred in Ireland and foaled at the Irish National Stud in 2004, the son of Montjeu travelled a remarkable road before eventually returning there in retirement.

Willie Mullins was able to visit his old champion shortly before the end, as was Gail Carlisle, who had looked after Hurricane Fly throughout his years at Closutton.

“It was very poignant and we were able to say our goodbyes.” Willie Mullins

Mullins described Hurricane Fly as “one of the greatest horses to ever come through our stable” and remembered above all the qualities which were not necessarily visible in a form book: his courage, his appetite for competition and his willingness to fight when another horse came alongside him.

“He was a horse who loved a battle and was so brave. He was awesome, one of the biggest legends ever to come through Closutton.” Willie Mullins

Considering the champions that have subsequently passed through Mullins’ hands, those words carry enormous weight.

From France to Closutton

Hurricane Fly’s route to National Hunt greatness was an unusual one. He was sold for €65,000 as a yearling and began his racing career in France with Jean Luc Pelletan, where he showed considerable ability on the Flat. As a three year old he won twice, including a Listed race at Saint Cloud in which he defeated Literato, who would subsequently become a Group One winner.

He was eventually bought privately to join Willie Mullins and made his first appearance for Closutton in a maiden hurdle at Punchestown in May 2008. He won, and later that month travelled back to France to win a Grade Three hurdle at Auteuil.

The first indication of quite how far he might go came later that year in the Royal Bond Novice Hurdle at Fairyhouse. Hurricane Fly won the Grade One under a young Paul Townend, providing the jockey with a breakthrough success at the highest level and beginning a remarkable sequence that would eventually reach 22 Grade One victories.

Townend never forgot what the horse did for his career.

“He played a huge part in my career. I had my first ride in a Grade One on him and was lucky enough to have some great days with him. He was a tough horse with a huge heart and a will to win. I owe him a lot.” Paul Townend

It was Ruby Walsh, however, whose name would become inseparable from Hurricane Fly’s.

Ruby Walsh and The Fly

Walsh rode many exceptional horses. Kauto Star, Big Buck’s, Quevega and Annie Power were among the champions with whom he was associated, which makes his assessment of Hurricane Fly particularly significant.

Following Hurricane Fly’s death, Walsh described him as “without doubt the best jumper of a hurdle I ever rode”.

That jumping ability was one of the qualities that separated Hurricane Fly from other elite hurdlers. Walsh could attack an obstacle without having to organise the horse underneath him because Hurricane Fly possessed an extraordinary ability to adjust himself.

“He was incredible, his accuracy, his bravery, the speed at which he could move his feet. He was bombproof.” Ruby Walsh

There was an engine to accompany that technique. Hurricane Fly possessed the pace of a horse who had been good enough to win at Listed level on the Flat, but he could also stay, battle and find something when challenged. Walsh summed the combination up beautifully, describing him as, “for a little horse, the perfect horse”.

The partnership’s defining stage would become Cheltenham.

Hurricane Fly arrived for the 2011 Champion Hurdle having established himself as Ireland’s leading two mile hurdler, while Walsh had only recently returned from injury. Paul Townend had partnered Hurricane Fly during Walsh’s absence, but Mullins restored Walsh to the saddle for Cheltenham.

Hurricane Fly justified that faith, defeating Peddlers Cross to give Mullins his first victory in the Champion Hurdle.

Fifteen years later, when asked following Hurricane Fly’s death to select one memory from their years together, Walsh returned to that afternoon.

“His first Champion Hurdle was a huge day.” Ruby Walsh

Hurricane Fly returned to Cheltenham the following year as defending champion but could manage only third behind Rock On Ruby. It would have been easy to regard that defeat as evidence that the crown had passed to a younger rival.

What happened twelve months later instead became one of the defining achievements of Hurricane Fly’s career.

At the age of nine he returned to Cheltenham and won the Champion Hurdle for a second time, reversing the previous year’s result with Rock On Ruby. In doing so, Hurricane Fly became the first horse for 38 years to regain the Champion Hurdle after surrendering the title.

That second victory perhaps captured Hurricane Fly better than the first. He was not a horse whose greatness depended upon an unbeaten record or a single spectacular season. His greatness came through durability, resilience and the ability to return year after year and continue beating elite opposition.

The king of Leopardstown

If Cheltenham established Hurricane Fly internationally, Leopardstown belonged to him.

He raced there ten times and won all ten, every one of those victories coming at Grade One level. Most remarkably, he won five consecutive Irish Champion Hurdles between 2011 and 2015. He also won four consecutive Punchestown Champion Hurdles from 2010 to 2013 and three successive Morgiana Hurdles.

Those bare statistics still fail to convey how long he dominated the Irish two mile division. Horses arrived to challenge him, champions emerged beneath him and younger legs were repeatedly expected to replace him, yet Hurricane Fly kept winning.

Walsh believes his dominance actually altered the careers of other horses. Reflecting on Hurricane Fly’s legacy following his death, he said his presence “forced generations to go different directions”, with horses who might otherwise have been campaigned as Champion Hurdle contenders instead being sent towards staying races.

There can be few greater measures of a champion’s authority than rivals choosing another division because he is waiting in this one.

Perhaps the finest example of Hurricane Fly’s longevity came at Leopardstown in January 2015. By then he was 11 years old and facing Jezki, the reigning Champion Hurdle winner and a horse four years his junior. Arctic Fire, six years old and representing the emerging generation, was there too.

Hurricane Fly beat them both.

It was his fifth consecutive Irish Champion Hurdle and, fittingly, the final victory of his career. He had begun winning Grade Ones as a four year old in 2008 and was still doing it as an 11 year old in 2015.

That longevity mattered enormously to Walsh when assessing the horse’s place among the greats.

“Greatness is all about a body of work. Hurricane Fly possessed a huge body of work and his longevity was remarkable.” Ruby Walsh

It echoed what Walsh had said when Hurricane Fly retired more than a decade earlier: “His longevity and durability is what will mark him out as one of the true greats in jumps racing.”

Time has done nothing to weaken that judgement.

Twenty two Grade Ones

Hurricane Fly retired having won 24 of his 32 starts over hurdles, without ever falling, and accumulated a then world record 22 Grade One victories. That record would eventually be surpassed by Australian champion Winx in 2019, but the number remains extraordinary in the context of National Hunt racing, where maintaining form and soundness across successive winters presents a very different challenge.

The victories included two Champion Hurdles, five Irish Champion Hurdles, four Punchestown Champion Hurdles, three Morgiana Hurdles and the Hatton’s Grace, alongside his other successes at the highest level.

Yet there is a danger in concentrating too heavily on 22, because Hurricane Fly was not loved simply because he accumulated Grade Ones.

He was loved because people knew him.

They knew the small frame that seemed almost at odds with his achievements. They knew the way Walsh could sit quietly approaching a hurdle, trusting the horse underneath him to sort out his own feet. They knew that when another horse came to challenge, Hurricane Fly was unlikely to surrender without a fight. Above all, Irish racing followers knew that when the familiar silks appeared at Leopardstown during the winter, they were probably about to see something they had seen before and somehow never tired of watching.

Mullins once described Hurricane Fly as possessing “speed and stamina and an incredible bravery and aggressiveness”, while Walsh said on the horse’s retirement that the only hurdler of his lifetime he could compare him with was the great Istabraq.

That was the company Hurricane Fly had earned the right to keep.

A champion in retirement

There was thankfully another chapter after racing.

Hurricane Fly was retired in August 2015 while still sound and well, rather than being forced from the sport by injury. Mullins said at the time that the decision had been made while the horse was “still in great order”, and Hurricane Fly subsequently returned to the Irish National Stud to join its Living Legends.

For more than a decade, racing supporters who had watched him at Cheltenham, Punchestown and Leopardstown were able to see him enjoying retirement.

Following his death, Mullins made a point of thanking Leona Harman at the National Stud for her care of the retired champions and paid particular tribute to Gail Carlisle, who had shared such a close relationship with Hurricane Fly during his racing career.

His owners, the Boyd and Creighton families, also remembered a horse who had given them experiences that stretched far beyond trophies and prize money.

“He provided us with so many great days and long lasting memories.” The Boyd and Creighton families

They thanked Mullins, Carlisle, Harold Kirk, the Closutton staff and the Irish National Stud for their care of him.

His death comes particularly soon after that of co owner Frank Boyd, something Mullins acknowledged made the moment even more poignant.

One of the greats

Comparing champions from different eras will always be part of racing. Istabraq, See You Then, Persian War, Night Nurse and Constitution Hill belong to different generations and faced different challenges, and no statistic can settle arguments about which hurdler was greatest.

Hurricane Fly does not need the argument settled.

His record is enough.

He won his first Grade One at four and his last at 11. He won 22 of them altogether. He won the Champion Hurdle twice, lost it and won it back. He won five consecutive Irish Champion Hurdles and remained unbeaten in ten appearances at Leopardstown. He won 24 of 32 races over hurdles and never fell.

More importantly, those closest to him have remained remarkably consistent in how they describe him.

Paul Townend called him a horse with “a huge heart and a will to win”. Willie Mullins remembers a horse who “loved a battle and was so brave”. Ruby Walsh, who knew better than almost anybody what a truly exceptional National Hunt horse felt like underneath him, called Hurricane Fly the best jumper of a hurdle he ever rode.

Walsh’s words on Hurricane Fly’s retirement in 2015 now seem particularly appropriate.

“He was some horse and his record speaks for itself.” Ruby Walsh

Eleven years later, it still does.

The 22 Grade Ones will remain in the record books, the two Champion Hurdles will remain part of Cheltenham history and the five successive Irish Champion Hurdles may never be repeated. But for those who watched him through those wonderful winters, Hurricane Fly’s legacy is not really contained in a number.

It is the sight of that little horse attacking a hurdle as though it were barely there, Ruby Walsh motionless above him, before finding another gear when the race began in earnest.

The Fly was 22 when he died. He had been retired for longer than many great racehorses ever compete, yet the affection for him had scarcely diminished.

Perhaps that is the final measure of what he became.

Not simply a champion, but one of those rare horses racing never really stops missing.

Hurricane Fly’s remarkable record