The meeting at Strömsholm on Saturday will be the first venture in Sweden for highly-experienced veteran Czech jockey Dušan Andrés, one of whose claims to fame is that he is the only jockey in modern times to have ridden the winner of both the Czech Derby and the Velka Pardubicka. In a career going back to before 1989, he has ridden 342 winners on the flat and 321 winners over fences, a combination that no Czech jockey can compete with.

In the Swedish Grand National, he will be riding 7-y-o Marcus Aurelius, the “third best” of the three Czech contenders, owned by Red Rebels, trained by Stanislav Popelka. On paper, Marcus Aurelius should be the second best of the pair of Popelka-trained runners in the race. Anything can happen on the track, of course, and Marcus Aurelius is a Strömsholm course specialist. In the each of the last two years, he has been the winner of a minor race on the Swedish Grand National day programme. He thus has a one hundred percent record in Sweden, while he has only managed to win once in 22 runs over fences in the Czech Republic.

“It’s a fact that he has more experience of racing in Sweden than I have,” Dušan Andrés admits. “His experience is from a different race, but he knows the fences and the track there, so the conditions shouldn’t be a surprise for him. He jumps very well, and a track with plenty of turns suits him. That should be an advantage at Strömsholm. We’ll see what kind of a chance we’ll have. There’s only a small field of runners, but that will be the same for everyone.”

Until now Dušan Andrés knows the course at Strömsholm only from hearsay and from videos. However, he is going to Sweden today (Friday), and will have plenty of time to get to know the conditions well. “From what I’ve heard, it’s a bit like a Swedish Benešov, and I’m curious to see what it is like in real life.” Benešov is a picturesque training centre not far south of Prague, on the edge of a forest, with a subsize racecourse with some very sharp bends. Andrés is known as a jockey who has been particularly willing to ride, on the flat and over fences, at the tight little Czech courses that some of our younger jockeys try to avoid. “I’ll have plenty of time to get to know the course, so there shouldn’t be a problem,” Andrés points out.

This year, Dušan Andrés has been dividing his time between riding and training, and also supporting his wife Jiřina Andrésová’s career as a race rider. She returned to race riding in 2015, after taking a seven-year break for family duties. Dušan encouraged her to return. She is one of our best female riders on the flat, and has 45 winners to her credit.

Dušan Andrés is well known to be one of the older jockeys who deplores the fact that some jockeys younger that him have agents, or phone round to trainers and owners themselves to ask for rides. It was therefore a surprise to hear that he was heading for Sweden.

“It’s true that I don’t phone round for rides, but when this opportunity arose, I was happy to take it up,” he explained. In the Swedish Champion Hurdle, Dušan Andrés will be on Vicody, which is also owned by Red Rebels and trained by Stanislav Popelka.

*** 

This interview by Petr Guth first appeared on the Czech-language pages of the Dostihový svět web pages. Translation and extra text by Robin Healey.