TOM Dreaper registered a first winner as a trainer at Thurles on Tuesday as the grandson, and namesake, of Arkle’s trainer won the opening Leugh Beginners Chase with Folly Master.

Dreaper took over the licence from father Jim on March 1st, with the former jockey becoming the third generation to train at fabled Greenogue, where star chasers Prince Regent, Arkle, Flyingbolt, Ten Up and Brown Lad gained fame.

At Thurles, Folly Master was his fifth runner and under Keith Donoghue, proved the well-backed 11/10 winning favourite, having raced with the pace and gone clear of runner-up Brucejack before the final fence.

The three and a quarter-lengths winner carries the colours of Declan and Elaine O’Farrell, and after the race a delighted Dreaper said: “I’d love to say this was a masterplan, it wasn’t.

“I trained point-to-point winners in my own name in recent years to differentiate the two setups - when selling began to get going, but this is different and is great. I’m glad to get that out of the way.

“The horse has improved hand over fist and this time last year he wouldn’t have run in a point-to-point so was a long way down the pecking order.

“He is what my father would want and what I want and that’s a stayer chaser for the future.

“We’ll definitely push on now and the way this game has gone, it is a 12 month a year job now so we’ll need to roll all jobs (winter and summer) in together. The job is changing and anything that will win a race, we’ll hope to give it a rattle.

“We have had some great traditional owners down through the years - long before I was ever thought of, and we don’t ever worry too much about the number of horses. As long as we keep the quality up and maybe push on.” Winters winner

In contrast, trainer Michael Winters has recently scaled back his operation but sent out Pana To Milan (4/1) to recent and consecutive course wins in the Killinan Handicap Hurdle.

Ridden by Liam McKenna, the mare won eased down by four lengths from Jay Pee M, with Winters reporting: “She was always running some kind of races but was never finishing out and needs to get things her own way.

“We moved yards recently and have our own well water now which might be the small thing that has made the big thing.”

The colourful trainer added: “The first time I bumped into the (Leave Him Alone) syndicate was when I won on a horse called Homer for Gerry Cully in a Guide Dogs Charity Race at Mallow a long time ago now. It was about 40 or 50 years ago and I was like John Wayne when I won!”