To say amateur jockey Diana Gillam has stepped up her racing game this year would be an understatement.

No stranger to the winner’s circle, the 33-year-old Gillam has been a constant fixture on the point-to-point circuit, mostly helping out her father, trainer Jeremy Gillam. But this year she is riding for Maryland trainer Jack Fisher in the amateur timber circuit, and her win at the 105th running of the $30,000 Grand National has many heads turning.

Riding Arcadia Stable’s Bubble Economy, the same horse she rode to second place at My Lady’s Manor (Md.) the weekend before, Gillam was in very good company, including Northwoods Stable’s two-time Maryland Hunt Cup winner Bug River (Blair Waterman Wyatt).
 
Not sure what to expect from the horse or the course, Gillam decided to follow the seasoned riders and picked William Meister on Classic Cal and Charlie Fenwick III on Make Your Own as her guides. Bubble Economy easily handled the much larger timber until the eighth fence, which he smacked hard, almost losing Gillam. After that mistake he was picture perfect, even gaining the lead a few times on the big timber course.

Coming into the second-to-last, Fenwick took over, but the 8-year-old son of Rakeen was not done and chased Make Your Own to the last, sailing over the smaller board fence to gallop into the stretch more than 3 lengths ahead of Make Your Own at the wire. Irvin S. Naylor’s Patriot’s Path (Russell Haynes) was third. Fisher said he did not do a lot to prepare the young Maryland rider for the formable course.

“I gave her a couple of films to watch, the 2005 and 2006 ones,” Fisher said. “I thought it would set up well for her. I figured it would probably be Billy out in front, and I told her whoever is in the lead to sit behind them, wait until you get to the second-to-last, then try to go head-to-head with the leader at the last.”

Gillam said the films were a big help, but unlike the Maryland Hunt Cup, which has a few fences of the same height (4’6″), the shorter distance means speed is even more of a factor in the Grand National.

“The race tapes were great,” Gillam said. “The last couple of years it was all Charlie so I knew I need to keep an eye on him, but [the tapes] didn’t really prepare me for the size of these things. Bubbles and I sort of figured it out as we went along, but they were really huge. He’s so clever. We work off a buddy system.”

She added about her near fall, “Two other horses were going for the same panel, and they sort of balked a bit and we lost momentum. I totally lost my irons when we hit, but Bubbles was nice enough to bring up his head and throw me back in the saddle.”

To date, Gillam has 22 wins on the flat and over fences. Five are sanctioned wins, and four of the point-to-point jumping wins are from this year alone. Gillam rides at the track at Pimlico (Md.) in the mornings and schools jumpers for her father in the afternoons, but until this year she had not really had any serious timber mounts.

She is game to do the amateur-only Maryland Hunt Cup or the Virginia Gold Cup. “I am just Bubble’s passenger,” Gillam said. “I will go where Jack wants me to ride.”

An Extra Incentive
For the first time ever, the Grand National and the Maryland Hunt Cup have a $30,000 bonus attached to the winner of both races in the same year. In the past 105 years, 22 horses have won both; the most recent were Welter Weight (1999) and Buck Jakes (1997).

Three horses have won twice—Ben Nevis II (1977-78), Landing Party (1969, 1971) and Winton (1942, 1946). But Mountain Dew is the reigning king, winning in 1962, 1965 and 1967, the only horse that won both races in the same years.

There was a little confusion in the $15,000 allowance timber regarding the actual path of the course, but veteran rider Blair Wyatt, riding Armata Stable’s Coal Dust, stayed out of trouble and won the race by more than 2 lengths over Sportsman Hall’s Private Attack (William Santoro).

Vesta Balestiere’s Shady Valley (Haynes) and Naylor’s Earmark (Garet Winants) were ruled off course. Stewards said Earmark was taken off course by Shady Valley. Haynes was fined $500 for going off course and then staying in the race.

“I am not sure what was going on,” Wyatt said. “It was pretty dodgy out there. Horses were jumping every which way. I heard a great deal of yelling, not at me, but I was beginning to wonder if anyone had actually walked the course.”

Horner Facing Long Recovery
The day was marred by a serious injury in the amateur highweight timber. Run over the smaller, movable timber fences, there were several lost riders and two fallers among the large field of 12. At fence 4, Augustin Stable’s big gray Senor Melchor (Stewart Strawbridge) fell over one of the smaller fences, and Thundering Home (Ellen Horner) could not avoid the fallen mount.

Luckily, the MedStar helicopter was already on the grounds as a sponsor of the races and airlifted Horner to the University of Maryland’s Shock Trauma Center. The flight was delayed for some time while the emergency medical technicians tried to stabilize the jockey and intubate her, but they were unsuccessful. At the hospital, the doctors were finally able to get the tube down her throat and put her on a ventilator.

Doctors placed Horner, 45, in an induced coma for two days to ascertain the damage. According to her sister, Hilles Whedbee, Horner has a severe concussion but does not have any new spine or neck damage.

She does, however, have slight swelling in the brain and a little bleeding, but it does not require surgery.

“We are very optimistic right now,” Whedbee said. “She is awake but can’t talk right now because of all the swelling in her neck and her tongue from where they tried to tube her. We are hoping in time she will make a full recovery.”

Horner suffered a fractured T5 and T6 vertebrae in a fall at My Lady’s Manor in 2005, spending the better part of the year in a protective brace.

Whedbee said Horner has partial paralysis on her right side, and the doctors believe this is due to the brain swelling.

They anticipate that Horner will be in the hospital for a week and then will undergo rehabilitation for the paralysis, which may take more than a year.

Substituting for an injured Darren Nagle, Blake Curry was the eventual winner of the race on Robert Kinsley’s Incomplete for trainer Ann Stewart.

“There were people all over the place,” Curry said. “It looked like those mobile timber fences actually rolled over when horses hit them. It was crazy.”

He added about Incomplete, “You know if Ann enters anything in a race it’s going to jump well and be really fit. I was happy to take the ride.”

Several trainers watching the race said the mobile timber fences lifted up and part of one tipped over. Peter Fenwick, the Grand National secretary of racing, deferred comment on the mobile timber fences, saying it is a matter for the National Steeplechase Association.

Dwight Hall of the NSA safety board said, “They are looking into the matter and are forming an independent committee to look at the fence construction” and will announce their findings to the public.

Sarah L. Greenhalgh