THE first four-year-old mares’ maiden may not take place until the Kildorrery – Lisronagh doubleheader on the final Sunday of the month, but that did not stop That’s Nice from becoming one of the first four-year-olds of either sex to win a point-to-point in 2024, a victory that she achieved against geldings in Bellharbour last Sunday.

In the past 30 years, it is a feat that has been achieved by 45 other mares, stretching back to Calishee, who beat the boys at Lismore in February 1994.

With the growing number of opportunities that have been afforded to young mares to compete solely against their own sex in the past decade, instances of mares beating geldings in a four-year-old maiden are not as common as they once were.

In the 16 years that followed the 1994 success of Calishee, at least one mare a year replicated her achievement up to 2010, and in fact, there were many instances of it happening on multiple occasions in a single year, with 19 doing so in the space of just five years between 2003 and 2007.

Unsurprisingly, with the growing depth in both divisions, not just numerically but also quality-wise, handlers have tended to keep mares to their own sex.

The month of February proves to be the slight exception to this at present, as no opportunities are available to them in four-year-old mares’ maiden races until the very end of the month.

Consequently, the temptation to take on the geldings with a forward mare has proven stronger, and for those who have taken the punt, results would suggest that it is a strong barometer for predicting future talent.

Prior to last Sunday’s success of That’s Nice, three mares had won their four-year-old maiden against geldings during the month of February in the past 10 years, and that is a trio that consists of Telmesomethinggirl, Brandy Love and Break My Soul.

The first named pair were both handled by the champion handler Colin Bowe for their debut successes, Telmesomethinggirl, winning at Ballinaboola in 2019, and perhaps encouraged by that feat, a year later, Brandy Love debuted successfully against geldings at Cragmore.

Telmesomethinggirl has since gone on to land the Grade 2 Mares’ Novice Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival for Henry de Bromhead and Kenny Alexander, one of five subsequent track successes for the now nine-year-old, who most recently got within a length and a quarter of the Galway Hurdle victor Zarak The Brave in the Grade 3 Limestone Lad Hurdle at Naas.

Brandy Love has eclipsed her subsequent track achievements by securing a top-level success in the Grade 1 Mares Novice Hurdle Championship Final at Fairyhouse in 2022.

Break My Soul is the most recent winner of the trio, having only achieved her four-year-old victory last year at Tinahely for Denis Murphy.

Sold subsequently for £290,000, she may not have made the breakthrough in two starts over hurdles for Nicky Henderson but has been placed in both.

On the balance of probability, that evidence augers well for the prospects of That’s Nice for the years to come.

THE jubilant scenes as West Of Carrig crossed the line at the Carrigtwohill fixture in Ballyvodock last Sunday highlighted the significance of a local winner on a point-to-point card.

Arms were thrown aloft from racegoers on either side of the run-in as the seven-year-old cleared the final fence to supply 22-year-old Adrian Browne with his first success on a horse trained locally by his father, Don.

Those scenes reinforce the importance of a local winner, retaining the connection between the sport and the local support base that is so critical to the success of fixtures.

Amidst the current ultra-competitive era, those victories put an even greater emphasis on the importance of the local hunt races. Dwindling entries within the category have put particular pressure on the position of the confined maiden on cards across the last 10-plus years.

The provisional summary for the 2008 spring season lists a total of 29 confined maiden races on the schedule of races, but flash forward to this year and just five hunts – Ballinagore, Co Clare, Waterford, United Bartlemy, and United Ballindenisk - will run a confined maiden during the spring term.

Thankfully, many others still retain a hunt maiden on their card, instead electing to switch the race to an adjacent hunt maiden in an effort to open the race up to a greater number of potential entries.

That is evident in the number of adjacent maiden races increasing from 12 in the 2008 spring provisional summary to 22 this spring.

Yet when all hunt races, such as winners’ races, are included, the total number of programmed hunt races has fallen by just under 40% between these two years, highlighting the challenge facing the regulator to preserve these races.

Encouragingly for those hunts who have switched from confined to adjacent hunt maiden races, their efforts to keep the race viable do seem to have been rewarded.

The Scarteen Foxhounds are the latest to make the switch with their hunt race, and tomorrow’s fixture at Comea highlights that.

Last year, when run as a confined maiden, the race attracted just five entries, three of whom were from the one handler.

This time around, and with the race now an adjacent hunt maiden, this is open to horses with hunter certificates from an additional four hunts in Tipperary and Limerick, the entry has shot up to 12.

On the same afternoon, the adjacent hunt maiden at Tallow has attracted a particularly healthy 18 entries, which follows hot on the heels of the 14 runners that contested the adjacent hunt maiden in Ballyvodock last Sunday.

There is certainly hope at present that adjacent hunt maiden races are holding their own and continue to preserve the crucial connections between the sport and its local routes.

Point-to-point ratings

COLIN Bowe has won the four-year-old maiden at the February fixture in Ballinaboola on two occasions, in 2018 with Envoi Allen and 12 months later with Telmesomethinggirl.

With both progressing into subsequent Cheltenham Festival winners, a particular burden of expectation now falls onto Korkoran (91+) to maintain that run.

This developed into a real sprint finish from the home bend over the shorter two-and-a-half-mile trip, and with three fences to be jumped in the straight, it proved difficult for any of the protagonists to stamp their authority on the race.

In contrast, both divisions of the five-year-old geldings’ maiden were strongly run and produced two taking winners in The Final Word (92+) and Forty Coats (90+).

At Bellharbour, That’s Nice (87+) was aided by her chief rival, Unknown Entity, missing the last in a four-year-old maiden of fine margins.

She was just one of a number of notable performances that were put in by mares on the afternoon. Later on that card, Siog Geal (84+) marked herself out as a potentially above-average individual by easily kicking clear of a fellow newcomer, as the pair left two proven mares trailing someway behind.

Similarly, at Ballyvodock, Mystical Goddess (81+) came from off the pace to defeat a pair of nice prospects, showing a turn of foot that should see her particularly effective over shorter trips.