CARLOW sports people rarely travel up to the capital with confidence but when it’s team Willie Mullins and his squad of equine Harlem Globetrotters, it’s a different story.

Galopin Des Champs, State Man and El Fabiolo lead a simply superb squad into battle at Leopardstown for the 17-time champion trainer. They are backed up by Gaelic Warrior, Fact To File and Grangeclare West who will conduct something of a Closutton civil war in the race of the weekend, the Ladbrokes Novice Chase on Sunday.

Crack novice hurdlers Ballyburn, Predators Gold and Loughglynn will be out to lay a marker while Storm Heart heads a team of six juvenile hurdlers on Triumph trial in the Spring Juvenile. That is not even counting the handicaps and the bumpers. William Hill go 5/6 for Mullins to equal his tally of eight winners at last year’s festival but it’s certainly not a long shot he hits that total in Grade 1s alone.

When accounting for the price of all of his runners in each Grade 1, Mullins is odds-on to win them all bar the Irish Arkle, where Marine Nationale puts up the only meaningful resistance in the markets.

With multiples a likely attractive avenue for punters, bookmakers ought to be on red alert for each of the two days. As of yesterday evening, Predators Gold/Storm Heart/Galopin Des Champs treble pays about 13/2, or just over 9/1 if you throw in Marine Nationale.

Tomorrow, surely the Gaelic Warrior/El Fabiolo/State Man/Ballyburn accumulator will prove most popular. The four-fold, at the current general prices, is working out at just 11/2.

Perhaps the most surprising horse running this week for Mullins is indeed Galopin Des Champs, with many presuming he’d go straight to Cheltenham after his monster performance in the Savills. That premonition is perhaps a function of the jumps racing world we live in now, so it is refreshing to see the reigning champion defend his title, and his unbeaten Leopardstown chase record, in the Irish Gold Cup.

He only faces three rivals but arguably the most important rival he has faced yet in Ireland in Fastorslow, who has taken his measure the last twice and fulfilling his trainer Martin Brassil’s dream of having a Gold Cup horse. While Galopin Des Champs looks a different proposition now, Fastorslow could well be also - he was very soft in the betting for the John Durkan on his seasonal debut and he still came through to score. He is the horse with the ideal profile and could well be the real Gold Cup deal for his trainer. But today is a big day.

If he can step into Willie’s World and come out with the goods for a third time in a row, he’ll be a bona fide Gold Cup horse alright.