Bunyola Boy takes Gowran feature for Hannon and Levey Richard Hannon’s British raider Bunyola Bay dominated from start to finish in the Irish Stallion Farms EBF Gowran Classic. Third on his sole juvenile start at Newbury, the Ghaiyyath colt opened his account with a narrow success on his return to action at Doncaster in late April to tee himself up for the €200,000 feature in County Kilkenny. After breaking smartly Bunyola Boy (11-2) was soon bowling along at the head of affairs and never really looked in any danger of being reeled in from the home turn, finding plenty for Sean Levey to score by three and a quarter lengths. “It was impressive and he had to be today. He’s relatively inexperienced and it was his first time going around a bend,” said Levey, sporting the colours of owner Michael Geoghegan perhaps better associated with top jumpers such as Kandoo Kid and Dynamite Dollars. “We’ve always liked him. To be honest looking at what the handicapper was possibly going to give him he would have had to find a lot here today, but he’s unexposed. “I thought looking at him in the ring he stood out quite a lot so potentially a nice horse has won a very nice race on a track that seems to have suited him very well.” When asked if he could be a stakes horses, the rider added: “You’d like to think so. Obviously you’d like to dissect the race and see what he’s beat on the day. I know a lot of horses actually had true marks in that, but you just want to see if he’s actually up to that. “At the moment you’d upgrade him for how well he handled the track. The way we rode him today is the way we normally ride him and it just seemed to suit an awful lot for the track today. “We’ll let some water go under the bridge and see how he comes out of it. He’s definitely a nice horse, how nice we don’t know.”
