NOT too surprisingly, Natalia Lupini takes the training honours this week, having saddled two winners at Dundalk last Friday and another one at the Co Louth track on Tuesday afternoon – her only runners over the two fixtures.
Robbie Colgan partnered the first of the trio, when landing last Friday’s mile maiden for three-year-old fillies on Powerful Lady. This Hello Youmzain bay, who finished second and third on the polytrack in December, is owned by Gary Devlin and Paul Heatley.
Roughly an hour later and over the same trip, Leigh Roche was in the saddle when Cousin Shay justified favouritism in division two of the William Hill Best Odds Guaranteed Handicap. This was a third win in four starts for the six-year-old Cotai Glory gelding, since he joined the Lupini yard and changed to the ownership of An Geall Is Fearr Teoranta. Roche was back on board Cousin Shay, when the bay again rewarded favourite backers over 10 and a half furlongs on Tuesday.
Luke McAteer also partnered a winner on Tuesday’s card while, across the water, Oisin Orr was on the mark at Lingfield last Thursday week, at Newcastle on Saturday and at Southwell on Wednesday. Darragh Keenan followed up a double at Newcastle last Friday, with a win the following day at Chelmsford.
National Hunt
Deckie Lavery was on board De Temps En Temps, when on his second racecourse start, the six-year-old Court Cave gelding brought up a four-timer for Co Meath trainer Gavin Cromwell at Fairyhouse last Saturday.
Lavery was also in the saddle when the dual-purpose Sixandahalf, who recorded the first of those four wins for Cromwell in the mares’ maiden hurdle, landed her bumper at Punchestown last April. The first winner at Fairyhouse, Bacchanalian, runs in the colours of Shane Wilson, who has had horses in the past with Graham McKeever.
England-based Co Antrim-born trainer Neil Mulholland moved on to the 50-win mark for the season with winners at Ffos Las on Saturday and at both Hereford and Newbury on Wednesday. At the Welsh fixture, where the former Patrick Turley-trained Handstands won the Grade 2 Novices’ chase, the first division of the two and a half-mile handicap hurdle was landed by the David Mitchell-bred six-year-old Dangerous Touch (Vendangeur – A Touch Of Sparkle, by Golan).
At Hereford, Mulholland’s winner of the opening two-mile novices’ hurdle was the 1/2 favourite Starcrossed Lover, a six-year-old Pillar Coral gelding, who was bred by Fergus Cumiskey out of the Beneficial mare Verona’s Sister. At Newbury, the concluding three-mile handicap hurdle went the way of another favourite, the former Jamie Sloan-trained Keable, who was following up a recent victory at Exeter. This eight-year-old Fame And Glory gelding was bred by Colm McHenry out of Sarahs Quay (by Witness Box).
AMY Lynam has written about last weekend’s sad death of the Belfast Telegraph’s racing correspondent Ron McKnight on page 11, but here I would like to extend my condolences to his wife Sandra and family.
NOT for the first time, the amazing Winged Leader proved the only Northern-connected winner on the point-to-point scene last weekend.
Trained by a very proud David Christie for John Hegarty and Jenny O’Kane, the 11-year-old Winged Love gelding was recording his 15th successive victory between the flags, when landing the five-runner open at Tinahely on Saturday under Barry O’Neill. This was the bay’s 28th point-to-point success and his 32nd in total.
On the plus side for local breeders, the winners of the two geldings’ maidens on the card, Welcome Back and Last Round, who are trained by Gordon Elliott for Ann Marie McManus, are Getaway brothers out of a Winged Love mare, in this instance the German-bred Fantastic Fleur, whose final foals they are. It was a good weekend for breeders in this country in general, with all but one of the winners at the three meetings carrying an IRE suffix.
Spring meetings
The first local point-to-point of 2025 is due to take place next Saturday, when the East Down Foxhounds’ hold the first of their two traditional spring meetings at the ever-important seaside venue of Tyrella.
At the corresponding fixture in 2005, when the five and six-year-old geldings’ maiden was divided to give a seven-race card, there were three local winners, viz Wilson Dennison’s Moonax gelding Bally Brakes, Kieran Shields’s Fourstars Allstar gelding Buffers Lane and Clare Cannon’s Alphabatim mare Waitwatchn’wunder.
There were no divides 10 years ago, but there were still three locally-owned and trained winners. Two of that trio, Ballyarthur, who was trained by Colin McKeever for Wilson Dennison, and Muirhead, who was trained by Stuart Crawford for Pat Sloan, were ridden by Derek O’Connor. Deckie Lavery had the mount on Mr Bolt who, in the care of Sean McParlan, landed the winners of two in the colours of Niall McCarthy.
THE first track meeting of 2025 in Northern Ireland takes place next Tuesday, January 21st, at Down Royal where the title sponsor is Molson Coors.
At the corresponding fixture last year, there were no locally-trained winners with the first three races being won by horses trained in Co Meath by Gordon Elliott and ridden by Jack Kennedy. The currently-sidelined jockey then went on to bring up a four-timer on another Co Meath-trained gelding, St Denis’s Well who, as mentioned last week, was bred locally by Andrew McNally.
The colours of the Derby Bar Syndicate were carried to victory in the two-mile, one-furlong handicap hurdle by the ill-fated Affinisea gelding Coco Kolada.
Two days after this meeting, the track’s chief executive Emma Meehan, alongside Horse Racing Ireland’s commercial manager Vicki Donlon, will be on a panel of speakers at an SVB (Sports Venue Business) LIVE global networking event at Leopardstown. This is described as a must-attend event for sports and entertainment professionals.