HRI to Celebrate Flat Champions in Dundalk

Horse Racing Ireland announced today that it has commissioned perpetual silver trophies to celebrate the Flat Racing Championships.

They will be presented as part of a celebration on the final day of the 2007 Flat season in Dundalk on Friday evening, 7th December.

Master craftsmen from Alwright & Marshall, Fade Street, Dublin, will make four custom-made perpetual Irish silver trophies, each set on a mahogany base and engraved with the names of the champion jockeys, trainers, owners and apprentices since 1950. (Up until 1950 the Flat and National Hunt Championships were combined).

The champions will also receive a hand-made silver tankard with a solid silver horse's head as its handle to keep as a memento of their achievement.

Brian Kavanagh, CEO of HRI said' 2007 was a good year for Irish Flat racing and the Championships look pretty clear-cut with three racedays to go before the end of the season. HRI has commissioned these new perpetual trophies to recognize the achievements of our jockeys, trainers, owners and apprentices in an appropriate way. The introduction of all-weather racing under floodlights provides Dundalk Racecourse with an ideal opportunity to celebrate the season's end on Friday evening 7th December.'

Another superb season in the saddle has seen Pat Smullen (98* wins) wrest his Champion Jockey title back from Declan McDonogh (80* wins) and land a Group One success in the Prix de l'Abbaye on board Mark Wallace's Benbaun, with whom he has struck up a great relationship which yielded three Group 3 victories at the Curragh. Dermot Weld's jockey, who will be the leading rider for the fourth time, also landed a Group 2 success at Headquarters on board Campfire Glow, who edged out Listen in the Ballygallon Stud Debutante Stakes, for his retained stable.

For the third time the leading apprentice is virtually certain to be Chris Hayes who has led the closest finish of the 2007 Flat season, with 36* wins, just six ahead of fellow apprentice Rory Cleary.

The Coolmore/Ballydoyle team will once again claim the Champion Owner and Trainer spots with Mrs Sue Magnier´s horses winning 40 races and ?3,331,000* in prize money. Aidan O´Brien leads the Flat trainer title battle in Ireland for the 10th time with ?5,110,000* in prize money. The trainers' and owners' championship are decided by prizemoney rather than numbers of winners (unlike the jockeys and apprentice championships). O'Brien's finest hour at home came when Soldier Of Fortune romped home in the Budweiser Irish Derby, giving the stable's second jockey Seamus Heffernan a well-deserved major success. The stable went on to add the Darley Irish Oaks with Peeping Fawn who reversed Epsom form with Light Shift to claim the second of her four Group One successes, while the stable also claimed the Irish Field St Leger as Yeats collared Scorpion close home to land the only Irish Classic which had eluded O'Brien to that point. In addition, who could forget the scenes in Leopardstown as Dylan Thomas led home stable companions Duke Of Marmalade and Red Rock Canyon to land his second Tattersalls Millions Irish Champion Stakes under Kieren Fallon.