Race switch this weekend

THERE are just six races at Fairyhouse today [Saturday] following heavy rain during the week which led to the cancellation of the two scheduled chases on the card. A handicap hurdle has been divided to make a six-race card.

One of the cancelled chases, a three-mile handicap, has been transferred to Navan on Sunday to make an eight-race card.

The hurdles track at Fairyhouse is heavy but there is fresh ground. Navan’s going is forecast as soft on all tracks.

New stallion at Knockhouse

FRENCH stallion Tirwanako has been purchased by Knockhouse Stud, and will stand at the renowned Co Kilkenny farm for the 2020 breeding season. Tirwanako is a 12-furlong listed race winner who was placed in group company. He has already sired a couple of very promising Irish pointers.

His pedigree is free of Sadler’s Wells blood, while Northern Dancer appears just once in the first five generations. Tirwanako is a son of the little-known Sin Kiang, a son of the Northern Dancer horse Fabulous Dancer.

Gone from the Knockhouse roster is Notnowcato, following a fatal heart attack. Aged 17, the Eclipse Stakes winner sired a Group 1 winner on the flat in Australian sprinter Redkirk Warrior, while his son Long Dog was a Grade 1 winner over hurdles for Willie Mullins.

Daryl Jacob injured

DARYL Jacob is to miss the busy Christmas period with a hand injury – and with it the mount on Footpad in the Ladbrokes King George VI Chase at Kempton on December 26th. Retained rider for Simon Munir and Isaac Souede, Jacob was riding the Ben Pauling-trained Guena Des Mottes at Musselburgh on Monday, when coming to grief at the third-last.

Papal Bull’s new home

PAPAL Bull sired his biggest winner to date when The Jam Man landed the Grade B handicap hurdle at Navan last weekend. The Group 2-winning son of Montjeu will stand in 2020 at Edward Lacy’s Ballycrystal Stud in Co Offaly.