AFTER a National Hunt season where the biggest festivals were generally dominated by Willie Mullins on both sides of the Irish Sea, it was encouraging to see a wide spread of winners get on the scoresheet at last week’s Tattersalls Irish Guineas Festival.

In total, there were 19 different trainers in the winner’s enclosure following the 24 races at the Curragh over the course of the three-day meeting. Aidan O’Brien (four), Ross O’Sullivan (two) and Ger Lyons (two) were the only handlers to notch multiple victories on the prominent weekend.

An inescapable element of the meeting was the success of British-trained runners on the Saturday and Sunday cards.

For the first time since 2004 - when Bachelor Duke (James Toller) and Attraction (Mark Johnston) captured the two classics - our neighbours pulled off the Irish Guineas double thanks to quality performances from Rosallion (Richard Hannon) and Fallen Angel (Karl Burke).

There was also a British wipeout in the Group 2 Weatherbys Ireland Greenlands Stakes, where the five visiting runners managed to finish in the first six places, led home by a one-two of Mitbaahy (Charlie Hills) and Regional (Ed Bethell). For good measure, the William Haggas-trained Candleford made all in the Listed Al Basti Equiworld Dubai Orby Stakes.

All told, the 11 British-trained runners in five different races at the Curragh last weekend yielded four winners. Those impressive takings were boosted by the two overseas challengers in the Tattersalls Irish 2000 Guineas finishing first and second. Every single British runner went home with prize money.

Perhaps one of the biggest surprises of the weekend was that no runner came from abroad for a crack at the Tattersalls Gold Cup, which had a boosted prize pot of €500,000 (from €450,000 in 2022 when Bay Bridge finished a close second for Sir Michael Stoute, and from €400,000 in 2021 when Alenquer scored for William Haggas). You can imagine they might well be back next year.

Much-needed depth

One way of looking at the British influence on proceedings is how different the feature races would have looked without their presence. The Greenlands Stakes certainly would have been a much lesser race, a seven-runner affair won by the 99-rated Ano Syra, while Sumiha would have beaten the 95-rated, 66/1 shot Starry Heavens in the Orby Stakes.

We also would have been hailing River Tiber as one of the leading milers around, in finishing four and three quarters of a length ahead of Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf winner Unquestionable in the Irish 2000 Guineas, with the 100-rated Take Me To Church in third.

In a World Pool era when broadening the international appeal of our marquee races to overseas audiences is important, increasing the competitiveness of feature events through British participation is something to be very much welcomed.

What the weekend’s results also did, however, is shine a light on a lack of depth in certain Irish divisions on the flat at present.

It is no secret that we have tended to be off the pace in sprint races on these shores when the British speedsters roll into town, and the one-two-four-five-six for the visitors in the Greenlands reemphasised that power imbalance.

The home challenge in the mile-and-a-half Orby Stakes wasn’t an overly strong one, albeit runner-up Sumiha clearly has a future, and the local three-year-olds came up short in the two classics.

It ought to be remembered, though, that the wider European crop of three-year-olds probably isn’t a vintage one this season. The number of horses who featured on the 2023 European two-year-old classification was at an all-time low since the annual listings began in 1978.

European landscape

The number of Irish-trained two-year-olds making the classification remained relatively stable last season, but the European handicapping teams reckoned that this was largely thanks to Ballydoyle. Of the 23 two-year-olds with a rating above 105 in Ireland at the end of the last campaign, O’Brien was responsible for 70% (16) of them.

When City Of Troy, Henry Longfellow and Ylang Ylang were directed elsewhere to start their season in 2024 - and with Opera Singer needing the run after a spring setback ahead of the Irish 1000 Guineas - it meant we probably did not get the strongest of Ballydoyle challenges on the Irish classics last weekend.

With that turnout in mind, it was a disappointment of sorts that the local runners were unable to capitalise. Instead, the visitors came, saw and conquered - and hats off to them for doing just that.

As the handicappers hinted at during last year’s European Classifications launch, the impact of Ireland’s promising young flat horses being consistently traded abroad could really be seeping through to the top end of flat racing, especially on a weekend like we’ve just had. Many trainers and owners invest in Irish horses for the very reason of trading their stock abroad, and they should not be knocked for when they successfully do so. It is an avenue that allows businesses to survive and thrive.

Even the top operations in the country are open to trading Group 1 horses. An example in last year’s European Classifications was the Joseph O’Brien-trained Islandsinthestream, runner-up in the Group 1 National Stakes and Criterium de Saint-Cloud who sold to Hong Kong privately in the off-season. As O’Brien put it to The Irish Field at the time of the sale: “Everybody needs to keep trading for the bottom line.”

End-product impact

While we might not be at a breaking point right now, the moment at which a talent drain takes away from our ability to assemble high-quality fields for the races in our shop window is getting closer, and that must be a concern for everyone.

There are initiatives being worked on by the authorities to incentivise connections to keep their horses in Ireland for longer - like the excellent new €200,000 Irish Stallion Farms EBF Gowran Classic this coming Monday - but any opportunities to sweeten the appeal of not selling these horses abroad at an early age need to be explored. Stronger prize money is an obvious target area, though the solutions whereby funds can be found to boost pots are not so obvious.

As has been highlighted by multiple trainers, the winners of the Listed Devoy Stakes, Heritage Stakes and Woodlands Stakes this season taking home just €24,000 for their achievements is not near good enough. To paraphrase a point well made by Ger Lyons on a recent episode of The Irish Field’s Leading The Field podcast, the winner of a low-grade 47-65 handicap can earn more money than the third-placed in any of these listed events, where they would have collected just €4,000 in stakes company.

There will always be those who want to trade young horses as their business. At the same time, there are also many more who want to see quality fields on marquee weekends in Ireland. The racing product central to the entire industry must be protected.

Britain is dealing with their own talent drain over similar factors, but this year they might well be better stocked in certain divisions than the Irish ranks. Results like we saw last weekend at the Curragh probably won’t be a one-off as the season progresses.