The response from Jim Bolger when asked whether it will be emotional when the time comes to walk out of the gates of Coolcullen for the last time after 44 glorious years, was straight, unflinching and typical.
“I don’t do emotion,” he says, in that deliberate manner, emphasising each word carefully with unseen punctuation.
That may well be true about the bricks and the mortar as he prepares to relocate to Beechy Park in Rathvilly, Co Carlow for the next chapter, but there would be plenty willing to bet that should Sparan Nua deliver a Group One with his parting shot, even the great man might be tempted to shed a tear.
The three-year-old filly will bid to deliver one last big race for the still master of Coolcullen in the Qatar Racing British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes at Ascot on Saturday — and on the form of her Yorkshire Oaks run against Kalpana, when she was denied by a short head on the Knavesmire, she has every chance.
It would be a fitting full stop for Bolger’s time at Glebe House, a run which stretches back to 1982 and has included so many highlights, you half suspect he is moving on because they have run out of wall-hanging space for the pictures.
Emmet Mullins will take over soon enough, with his operation concentrating on the Flat, but good luck shifting a legacy that could take a lifetime to eclipse with almost 3,000 winners, including 13 Classics and 57 at Group One level.
The likes of St Jovite, New Approach, Teofilo, Dawn Approach and more recently the 2,000 Guineas winner Poetic Flare were just some of the stars which dazzled.
All of them seared on the memory of the uniquely talented Bolger (84) and etched into the fabric of the place he will leave behind.
Trainer Jim Bolger’s Glebe House and racing base in Coolcullen for the past 44 years, which will soon be taken over by Emmet Mullins
“It will be probably weeks rather than months before we go, but I already have my new set-up ready to go. It is Beechy Park in Rathvilly, in Carlow,” he explained.
“We bought it 14 years ago and we had a mile-and-a-quarter grass gallop there which we used for an away gallop all the time since then. We have had a few Classic winners and Group One winners who did their final preparations there, so it won’t be anything new to us.”
Bolger used to breed his racehorses in Wexford, with the colt yearlings being sent to Beechy Park and the fillies to Coolcullen. He also used Beechy Park for away days for several of his Classic stars.
He said: “Dawn Approach had his press day there before he won the Guineas and Pleascach, the filly that won the Irish 1,000 Guineas [in 2015] would have done her final work there, and of course Poetic Flare was practically trained there from his two-year-old days onwards.
“He was a champion in France and a champion miler in Ireland, so the gallops can’t be too bad.”
Andrew Balding’s classy filly Kalpana is likely to be Sparan Nua’s biggest threat when the pair renew rivalry at Ascot on Saturday © Richard Sellers/PA Wire
Sparan Nua may not quite be in that bracket but Bolger’s faith in his filly, so nearly justified in that last unsuccessful charge at the line at York, has not been shaken by a below-par run in Paris last time out behind Friendly Soul in the Prix Vermeille.
“We felt it was the ground at Longchamp. She just didn’t come down the hill into the straight very well,” said Bolger, who concedes he is not looking for revenge with Kalpana.
“We are not quite looking for that,” he says, bristling at the notion. “We would be delighted to win no matter who is second. The course will suit as Ascot suits every horse if they are good enough.”
It would be a fitting end to the particular chapter Bolger is writing even if he insists he is not at the finish of his training story.
Sparan Nua may yet stay in training next year and could move along with Bolger to Beechy Park.
“We take one step at a time,” he said. “It is likely that she will stay in training, but a final decision will be made at the end of the year. It is to be decided at the end of the year.”
Either way, the Dawn Approach filly out of a mare called Sparanai — which only won a lowly handicap at Dundalk and yet which the shrewd Bolger saw something in her character he liked — could provide the perfect leaving present.