Pearl shines at Aintree

Florida Pearl came back to his brilliant best as he impressively landed the Stg£120,000 Martell Cup, the feature race on the first day of Aintree`s Grand National meeting.

Ireland`s top chaser had disappointed his many supporters when below-par in the Tote Cheltenham Gold Cup on his latest start, but showed that run to be all wrong when scooting up from Cyfor Malta.

Sent into the lead by jockey Barry Geraghty down the back straight, the 5-2 winner sealed success with some impressive jumps at the third-last and second-last fences.

As his rivals blundered away their chances, Florida Pearl pulled right away to beat Cyfor Malta by 11 lengths with favourite Lord Noelie - who bled from the nose afterwards - a neck back in third.

Florida Pearl was only taken out of Saturday`s Martell Grand National field at the final declaration stage when connections decided that this contest represented a more suitable contest.

But trainer Willie Mullins said that the 10-year-old could be aimed at the National next year.

'I don`t regret taking him out of this year`s race but he could come back next year, it`s a race everybody would love to win,' said Mullins.

'I am thrilled to have won this race. I think he might have had a bit of an infection at Cheltenham, which was disappointing.

'We scoped him beforehand and nothing showed up. But we gave him a lung wash after Cheltenham, it took five days to get the result but it did show something.

'Sometimes when you have a good horse it`s hard to work them hard enough and be sure just how fit they are because it`s impossible to get them to really go.

'I just wish I could get him to the Gold Cup as well as he was today.

'He took a while to get warmed up today and he was a bit sticky early on but then he really started to enjoy himself.

'It`s probably the fastest ground he`s ever raced on and it`s suited him but I think just having him right on the day is the most important thing.'

For a variety of reasons, Florida Pearl has been partnered by many of the best jumps jockeys in Britain and Ireland, and Geraghty was becoming the eighth rider to be successful on him.

'He took a little time to warm up but it was the first bit of good ground he`d been on this season,' he said. 'Willie and I had a good chat beforehand and we agreed that if they were going quick enough we`d just follow them early on and that`s the way it went.

'The way he jumped the third-last and the next was just amazing, there was so much horse under me it was an incredible feeling.

'You can`t knock a horse like this - he`s won three Hennesseys, a King George and now a Martell Cup. It was a pleasure to ride him.'

Despite his exertions here, Florida Pearl may run again before the season is out.

'I might go to Punchestown with him now,' Mullins said. 'There`s no reason why he hasn`t got at least another season in him after that.

'His whole training career has been aimed towards getting to 11 or 12 and that`s why I deliberately haven`t gone to every cock fight around the country.'

Connections of Cyfor Malta were far from disappointed with the runner-up`s efforts.

'He was a bit too free with the blinds on, and it would have been better if Tony (McCoy) had been able to drop him in a bit more,' said Chester Barnes, assistant to trainer Martin Pipe.

'The mistake four-out was no help to him either but at least he has run better than he did at Cheltenham.'

Lord Noelie`s trainer, Henrietta Knight, was more downcast.

'He has broken a blood vessel and that could be serious for him,' she said.