Irish Panther scores on chase debut Irish Panther (5/1) scored on his chasing debut at Naas today, landing the Sign Up To GavinLynchRacing.com Beginners Chase for joint-trainers Eddie and Patrick Harty and jockey Kieren Buckley. Bought in-training for 19,000gns in October 2024, the eight-year-old had been placed over hurdles at both the Dublin Racing Festival and Punchestown festival earlier this year and at Clonmel last month, gained a breakthrough win when scoring by 31 lengths. Today, Buckley steered prominent-racing Irish Panther to an eight lengths win over Jacob’s Ladder, with Eddie Harty commenting “that was exciting and he’s a nice horse. “You don’t improve horses coming from Edward O’Grady (previous trainer) but we were just lucky. He had a few issues which were well touted and we just treated him as he is. There’s no mad science to it, we know what he needs and he’s always had the engine. “He won very well in Clonmel, which he was entitled to do, and I thought that was a very good performance there. He jumped really well and what really amazed me was how quickly he put it to bed, he actually sprinted.” He added “the Racing Post Novice Chase at Christmas would be more than likely where we go now. I don’t know if he’ll go again in between as he’s had two races now in three weeks which is enough for him in my opinion. “I’m delighted for Brian Whelan and Jennifer Coyle. They took the chance, wanted a horse that would take them to nice meetings and he has done that. Patrick (Harty) always wanted to go chasing, he looks like a chaser and jumps like a chaser. He’s exciting, time will tell how good he turns out to be, but he can’t do any more than he did today.” Quotes from Gary Carson
