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Costacurta another for in-form de Bromhead

Costacurta and Darragh O'Keeffe Costacurta and Darragh O'Keeffe
© Healy Racing Photos

Costacurta justified his short price with an impressive performance in the two-mile-three maiden hurdle at Kilbeggan.

The Henry de Bromhead-trained Milan gelding went off a 4/7 shot having been as big as 2/1 this morning.

Darragh O’Keeffe, completing a double on the card, went on crossing the road on the hotpot as Ardeen Joy ran out.

He had to shake his mount up briefly before the last but he soon asserted and put daylight between himself and his rival late on to record a 17-length success.

The winner had chased home a smart horse in Kiss Will on his only previous start at Fairyhouse in January.

O’Keeffe said:- “He was very good. We just wanted to get him to switch off and do things right.

“Looking at the paper there wasn’t going to be a whole lot of pace in it. He’s still very inexperienced so we said we’d take a lead.

“We didn’t go that mad but in fairness he settled and jumped. When Kevin Sexton went on and injected a bit of speed it was ideal.

“He did it very well and was still green, he’ll come on plenty from it.

“I even had to shake him up because Kevin’s horse was hanging out to her left and when I went up his inside my lad was kind of looking to see why he was going out that way, he was just green.

“He quickened very well and jumped the last well, I’d say he loves a bit of nice ground as well.

“I think he’ll benefit from a sounder surface and hopefully he’ll go up through the ranks as a novice during the summer.”

About Gary Carson
Gary started out as a trainee/assistant journalist with the Sporting Life newspaper and has worked in the racing industry for over 25 years. He has been with the Press Association since 2013 and won the Irish Field Nap Table in 2016. He enjoys working with horses and trained his own horse, Mamaslittlestar, to win a point-to-point in 2019.