Golden Rules owner Cheshire eager to be Plate smasher

Anticipation is building for owner Gareth Cheshire, as his horse of a lifetime Golden Rules heads to Newcastle on Saturday with “unfinished business” in the JenningsBet Northumberland Plate.

Cheshire’s bullish pre-race predictions grabbed the headlines ahead of the ‘Pitmen’s Derby’ in 2023 and after going agonisingly close, he has redemption on his mind ahead of this latest visit to the north east.

“I haven’t slept for three weeks and I certainly won’t be sleeping until Saturday,” said Cheshire.

“I’ve renamed the Northumberland Plate as ‘unfinished business’ and I’m really looking forward to it. I live and breathe this horse and I will never get another like him if I live to 1000.”

Golden Rules was trained by Deborah Faulkner when hitting the crossbar in the Gosforth Park feature two years ago, but it is now her son Thomas overseeing the fragile eight-year-old’s precision preparations after another 600-day plus absence for the team to contend with.

The gelding returned from his latest layoff in the exact same Kempton contest (Queen’s Prize Handicap) he did in March 2023 and has since been meticulously pointed to the Northumberland Plate.

And in another case of deja vu, Cheshire will once again swap the White Isle of Ibiza for Tyneside to watch his pride and joy in action.

Cheshire added: “He’s a horse of a lifetime for me at my level and at 3.20pm on Saturday you could have witnessed the training performance of the year because the effort that goes into this horse in unbelievable.

“The days are almost exactly the same as what we tried in 2023 and it’s all been planned to the minute for Saturday.

“Again like in 2023 I’ve had to cut short my holiday to Ibiza to go to Newcastle which hasn’t gone down too well and no doubt there will be another handbag involved, but fingers crossed it goes well.

“They have done an unbelievable job with this horse and even though Tommy (Faulkner) has tried to put a complete media ban on me, I am supremely confident.”