OF the eight Grade 1 races run at Leopardstown last weekend, three of the winners were trained by Willie Mullins and two by Gordon Elliott with four of those five having been purchased at one stage by Harold Kirk.

The Unibet Irish Gold Cup winner Bellshill was of most interest to Northern readers having been sold as a foal at the 2010 Tattersalls Ireland November Sale by his Co Cork breeder, Frank Motherway, to Cullybackey’s Ian Ferguson. The latter was acting on behalf of Wilson Dennison in whose colours the King’s Theatre gelding was second in a four-year-old maiden at Moira in March 2014 on his only start between the flags. Bellshill was a 4/6 chance that day, with punters obviously sharing the confidence of the bay’s then trainer, Colin McKeever who commented: “He always struck us as a real good horse and I told someone that morning that there wasn’t a four-year-old alive that could beat him but, as it turned out, there was!”

However, the reputation of the Loughanmore nursery was, and is, so high that, following that second-placing, Kirk had no hesitation in recommending Bellshill to Mullins and Graham Wylie and the horse has since won two bumpers (one at Grade 1 level), four hurdle races (including two Grade 1s) and now five chases (two Grade 1s).

Disappointingly, the Moira winner, Mahler Lad, has come nowhere near achieving these heights with just three handicap chase wins to his credit.

Another Loughanmore graduate to catch the eye in the past few weeks was Birchdale who, on his sole outing for Dennison and McKeever, landed the four-year-old maiden at Tyrella in March last year under Derek O’Connor. Now owned by J.P. McManus and trained by Nicky Henderson, the Jeremy gelding is two for two over hurdles, his most recent success coming late last month in the Grade 2 Ballymore Novices’ Hurdle at Cheltenham where he recorded a runaway 18-length victory in the hands of Barry Geraghty.