How did you get interested in racing?

My father had horses back thirty years ago. I’ve always had a bit of an interest in watching racing especially the likes of the Nationals and the big races. I always had the idea of buying one.

How did the Derby Bar Syndicate come about?

Well, Aidan, Declan and I were at a wedding one time in Cabra Castle. The three of us there were part of another syndicate at the time. There were about 20 in that one but we were at the tail end of it so we didn’t have much input. At the wedding, we discussed buying a horse between the three of us. That discussion happened in a bar called the Derby Bar in Cabra Castle and the syndicate was born.

On Easter Monday, Where’s Frankie runs in the Irish Grand National, tell us about him and the journey you have been on with him.

About a month after we set up the syndicate, Karl phoned us up to tell us he had found a horse for us. It was a private buy from a guy in Limerick. It’s been an amazing journey. He came from point-to-pointing and we didn’t do much with him the first year. The following year he won at Fairyhouse on New Year’s Day, we were actually in Lanzarote at the time so we watched it from over there. He won very well that day. He won three times that year all of which were at Fairyhouse. He has come back a much fresher and more rejuvenated horse this year and we are looking forward now to Monday.

The craic we have had with this lad is incredible. When you have a horse coming to the last fence with a chance of winning, the excitement is unreal.

You all must be very excited about even having a runner in the Irish National?

We are indeed. We go to Fairyhouse most years for Easter. It’s a great day out. We usually book a table or two in the Bobbyjo but we have a few more coming down this year so we will have four or five tables. We are very excited to even have a runner in the race. Frankie is probably a big outsider, he has very little weight. There are a lot of good horses ahead of him in the ratings so just to have one in the race is fantastic. We will all head across together as one big group to Fairyhouse. There is great excitement building.

Can you give any sort of indication of what the confidence levels are like going into the race?

Initially we planned to go to the 0-140 rated race, which is the race after the National. Karl rang us up a few weeks ago and explained how the way Cheltenham and Aintree has fallen around Fairyhouse this year, that there is a possibility of a 123-rated horse getting into the Irish National.

Our original plan was to go for it next year but Karl was keen to give it a go this year. The trip isn’t a problem for him. The ground shouldn’t be a problem for him, he is a soft-ground horse and has won on that before. He wouldn’t want it drying up too much but I don’t think it will, and he will get around, so he ticks a lot of the boxes. We are hoping that he will be in the mix.

Karl is quite close to Fairyhouse and the local trainers tend to have a good record in the race. Tell us about Karl himself and your relationship with him.

He is a very shrewd man, he knows what he is doing. You can lift the phone to him anytime you want. He is very personable. He is fantastic to work with and for a small yard, he is well able to train winners. We have had three horses in training with him this year, unfortunately, one of them took a bad fall at Catterick, but at that stage, the three horses that we had with Karl had won races. I want to also give a mention to the girl that looks after Where’s Frankie, Emma. Emma is fantastic, she is on the ball and has done a lot of work with Frankie. Say when we would be racing at Fairyhouse, I’d say to Karl “come on up for a drink”, and he’d say “no, she doesn’t let me”, and it’s Emma, not his wife, that doesn’t let him! She wants to get the horse home and get him out on the grass for a few hours. She is a real animal lover and she has been brilliant with Frankie.

You have another horse, Mighty Oak Lad, who ran

recently as well.

Yeah, he is another lad who won his first race on New Year’s Day at Fairyhouse. He won very easily that day. He lost a shoe on his next outing. He ran in his first chase last Saturday at Navan and finished third. He is a very genuine horse.