Witches Familiar impresses again at Gowran The Willie Mullins-trained Witches Familiar (2/5) was an impressive and eye-catching winner of the Grade 3 BoyleSports Novice Hurdle for Paul Townend, running out a wide-margin 10-length winner. There was an honest pace throughout the contest between the Gordon Elliott-trained Mino Des Mottes and Switch From Diesel, and momentarily it looked like Paul Townend was struggling to lie up with the leaders, but once the daughter of Zarak warmed to the task, she strode on very impressively and left her rivals with a nice turn of foot to seal the contest and could be one for the notebooks going forward. Speaking after the race, assistant trainer David Casey said: "She was good in Galway and did it well again. Paul was delighted with her, thought she was good and relaxed and when he had to grab hold of her, her reaction was instantaneous. He said that she keeps surprising him and keeps getting better. "I was watching her down at the last hurdle and couldn't believe the speed of her; I thought, 'How did I do that for 20 years!' "There is a good gap between here and the Royal Bond, so that is a possibility and, long-term, you'd be thinking about the Mares' Novice Hurdle at Cheltenham. She has been running on good ground but was with us all last winter and had no issues with our heavy all-weather gallop, so I'm hoping she'll be fine on soft."
