WINNING the Cheltenham Gold Cup is the pinnacle of jump racing and everyone in Irish racing and beyond must have been pleased to see the one glaring omission from the Willie Mullins roll of honour removed with Al Boum Photo’s success.

Thursday saw some brilliantly emotionally winners of the Grade 1s and Altior was the hero on Wednesday. The National Hunt Chase unfortunately took the headlines from day one.

It meant that the achievement of winning the Champion Hurdle with your first runner, a most notable achievement by Gavin Cromwell, got lost in the week. The talking horse flopped by Espoir D’Allen was under the radar and is the one to follow.

FAREWELL KYLECRUE

WE intended to feature a horse in this publication each week that deserved special mention and give him a Horse of the Week award. This week, it’s a bit of a sad one as one who deserved special mention fpr his achievements was the John Ryan-trained Kylecrue who was lost at Wexford last week. We thought we’d still give him one last photo.