A NEW season of point-to-pointing bursts into life this afternoon with Toomebridge the first of 27 fixtures in the autumn term.

Handlers in the northern region will need to make a speedy start to the season if they are to have runners in their home district. There are just four fixtures scheduled there for the autumn campaign, three of which take place over the first three Saturdays of the season.

Front-loaded

The front-loaded programme of fixtures is not a new problem for the region’s handlers to grapple with but, with just the four fixtures set to take place there this autumn, the issue facing them is all the more pronounced this time around.

Five of the six races run this afternoon in Toomebridge are for maidens, as is the case at Loughanmore later in the month, which leaves the region that has produced the champion point-to-point horse in three of the last four seasons staging just two open lightweight races in the first three months of the season.

Elsewhere, the month of October will also see the only new course to the autumn calendar unveiled, with the Island Foxhounds racing at Peppard’s Castle on Sunday, October 20th.

Inaugural fixture

Located north of Kilmuckridge in Wexford, the left-handed track had been due to stage its inaugural fixture earlier in the year, but that proved to be one of the many changes that had to be made to the spring calendar when the fixture was relocated to Ballycrystal.

The aforementioned Ballycrystal does still feature in the autumn campaign, as it will host one of three fixtures on the final weekend of the autumn term, with Boulta on December 7th, and Ballycrystal and Tattersalls following 24 hours later, to bring the pre-Christmas season to a close.

That Ballinagore fixture has typically been held in mid-January, ensuring a significantly different programme of races, with a race each for four-year-old mares and geldings scheduled.

Before that, racegoers will notice one change over the coming weeks, with all fixtures throughout the month of October scheduled to start at 1pm, which is a full hour earlier than would have been the case in previous years, in a move which is likely to please riders, stable staff and handlers alike.

Refused

This season, riders will no longer be able to continue in a race once their mount has refused at a fence in an amendment to rule 33 (ii) (a).

Disqualification will follow for any rider that does so, in a measure that has had to be introduced in response to a mares’ maiden at Bandon earlier in the year which took close to 10 minutes to complete, as the race winner was reported to have refused at the final fence, before negotiating it at a second attempt.

That particularly impacted upon the four-year-old maiden division, the net effect of which is likely to be a bumper pre-Christmas campaign with handlers seeking to play catch-up.

The early hunter certificate numbers give hope of that. A total of 543 horses had already been registered ahead of the entry deadline for this weekend, which is up from 486 at the same point ahead of last season commencing.

Starting the season with two fixtures on the opening weekend, rather than the one of last year, will certainly have contributed to that, as it would seem it is the large carryover of four-year-olds from the spring, with this age division alone accounting for over half of all hunter certificates at the moment.

That can certainly be seen in the entries for the season’s opening two fixtures, which have both enjoyed a positive boost in numbers.

Larger entry

Entries of 70 and 93 for Toomebridge and Castletown-Geoghegan, respectively, are up on the corresponding fixtures last season. Toomebridge alone has only once had a larger entry for the autumn fixture in the past decade, which certainly bodes well for the strength of competition up to Christmas.

One handler, in particular, can be credited with significantly contributing to this early season boost, with Colin Bowe single-handedly responsible for one in five of all this weekend’s entries, highlighting the busy campaign that he is likely set to have over the coming weeks.

The reigning champion handler has so far had 64 hunter certificates registered in an early warning sign for his rivals of the force that he is likely to be this autumn as he plays catch-up for a somewhat underwhelming first half of 2024 by his own lofty standards.

Tomorrow’s card at the Westmeath venue hosts the first open lightweight of the season, and it is often the first sight point-to-point racegoers will have of some of the new additions to the division that will feature for the weeks and months ahead.

Handler to follow

In recent years, Gordon Elliott has proven to be the handler to follow at this meeting, saddling the winner of the last three editions of the race courtesy of The Bosses Oscar, Hardline, and Out Sam.

However, with the Cullentra trainer without an entry for tomorrow’s renewal, it is his fellow county man, the former rider-turned-handler Ger Fox, who is perhaps responsible for the most notable track recruit to feature among this weekend’s entries. He could saddle the prolific track winner Go Another One tomorrow afternoon, in what will be a first start for the now 12-year-old since last year’s Connacht National.

In 42 runs for his previous trainer John McConnell, the Stowaway gelding, who started his career pointing as a four-year-old with Colin Motherway, won 14 times, including the Grade 3 Michael Purcell Memorial Novice Hurdle back in 2019.

The ex-Elliott and Gigginstown House Stud’s Bestaline has joined Simon Cavanagh for his prospective open debut, while five-time track winner Pat Coyne could return to the pointing fields for the first time since 2019.

They will not have things their own way, however, as they could potentially come up against David Christie’s three-time open winner from last season, Au Fleuron, and the returning grey Dento Des Obeaux. He finished a creditable sixth in the 2023 Aintree Foxhunters on his penultimate start.