Power retains faith in Our Duke Robbie Power retains all his faith in Our Duke despite finishing only fourth in the Irish Gold Cup on Sunday. The Irish Grand National winner was treated for a kissing spine after his first run of the season, yet was still sent of favourite at Leopardstown. "I was absolutely delighted with Our Duke coming into Sunday's Irish Gold Cup. Realistically it was his first run of the year after the non-event we had at Down Royal," said Power of Jessica Harrington's eight-year-old. "He was a little big ring-rusty at the start but the further we went, the better he got. I still thought we had a big chance coming to the second-last but unfortunately he made a novicey mistake. "Hopefully he'll improve an awful lot from the run and the pleasing thing for me was when he picked up in the straight, he stayed galloping away. That means there's plenty to look forward to with him this season. "He's got loads of options, The Cheltenham Gold Cup, the Irish Grand National, the Punchestown Gold Cup. Hopefully he'll be picking one of them up before the season is done." Just 24 hours earlier, Power caused a minor shock when beating Faugheen on Harrington's Stayer's Hurdle fancy Supasundae in the Irish Champion Hurdle. "We were taking Saturday's Irish Champion Hurdle as a prep run for Supasundae so if he had finished second or third we would have been delighted. To get the better of Faugheen and win the race was just an absolute bonus," Power told his Boylesports blog. "We went a nice even gallop. I thought after the second-last that Faugheen was going to pick up and leave us all behind but Supasundae put his head down and once we stayed within striking distance I knew that coming to the last, we could outstay him. "Supa has only had three runs this year so it was a good idea of Jessica's to run him over two miles instead of a three-mile slog. Hopefully it will all work well for Cheltenham."
