Punchestown racegoers will be treated to two Champion Hurdle winners in two days as following on from Honeysuckle on Friday, Epatante heads the field for Saturday’s Coolmore Kew Gardens Irish EBF Mares Champion Hurdle.

Nicky Henderson is double handed in the penultimate Grade 1 of the season as Cheltenham’s Mares’ Hurdle winner Marie’s Rock takes on her 2020 Champion Hurdle winning stable companion Epatante with nine runners going to post.

The newest Grade 1 to the Punchestown Festival has been farmed by Willie Mullins since it became a top-level race in 2013 with Gordon Elliott’s victory with Apple’s Jade the only time the champion trainer has failed to win the two-mile-three-furlong contest.

Frank Berry, racing manager to JP McManus is hoping that Epatante can crown a fine season on Saturday.

“When Epatante handled the extra half mile in the Aintree Hurdle so well, that gave us more options and with Honeysuckle in the Paddy Power Champion Hurdle, it made sense to go for the Coolmore Kew Gardens Irish EBF Mares Champion Hurdle over 2m 3f,” Berry said on Thursday.

“Nicky has done a fantastic job with her to get her back to such good form this year. Win, lose or draw, she’s had a great year but we’re looking forward to seeing her running on Saturday.”

This year Mullins will take on the formidable Henderson duo with Burning Victory, who is the mount of Paul Townend, last year’s winner Stormy Ireland, who will be reunited with Danny Mullins and Dysart Diamond and Shewearsitwell.

Lorna Fowler is a trainer aiming to cause an upset on Saturday as the eight-year-old Politesse takes her chance in the €125,000 contest.

Fowler is hoping that the daughter of Beat Hollow will show more than her bare form suggests this weekend.

The trainer said: “She needed the run in Aintree and we knew that. When I took her to Punchestown last season for this race, I hadn’t got a run into her and she wasn’t 100 per cent when finishing fourth to Stormy Ireland. She showed the benefit of that when winning her beginners’ chase back at Punchestown at the end of the month.

“We haven’t always had a clear run with her and she still has a lot to prove but she has worked well and is in good heart.

“We will go back over fences with her again but I think for now, it’s the right thing to go back to hurdles.”

The Henry de Bromhead-trained Telmesomethinggirl was still travelling well when getting brought down in the Cheltenham race won by Marie’s Rock and the trainer is excited about the Kenny Alexander-owned mare lining up.

“Telmesomethinggirl was travelling well and just beginning to make her move when brought down in the Mares’ Hurdle at Cheltenham at the second last,” the Waterford handler recalled. “Rachael had nowhere to go and it was a nasty enough fall but there wasn’t a bother on her after or and she’s been good since so we’re looking forward to Saturday and just hoping for a clear run.”

The Paul Hennessy-trained Heaven Help Us was only beaten eight-lengths at Cheltenham and will seek a first win since her famous Cheltenham success last year, while Paul Nolan is hoping that Mrs Milner will have more luck than last time out at Cheltenham when she was most certainly unlucky in running.

“She ran a stormer at Cheltenham,” Nolan said. “We haven’t been hard on her this season. We had our plans made out to go to Cheltenham and then Punchestown. It didn’t happen at Cheltenham but I thought she was unlucky.

“She’s in good form. Ground-wise, she’s very versatile but she has to improve. The two mares that fell in that race, Indefatigable and Telmesomethinggirl were going okay so we don’t know but she was unlucky.

She was nearly brought to a standstill at the second-last and brought out wide as well and I thought that the way she came home, on that basis, she’d have definitely been fighting out the finish anyway.”

Willie Mullins is enjoying another fruitful week at Punchestown and fires a very strong candidate at the Ballymore Champion Four Year Old Hurdle as Triumph Hurdle winner Vauban tops the line-up.

The Triumph Hurdle winner will look to frank the form with Triumph Hurdle runner-up Fil Dor who has been declared for Gordon Elliott and owners Andrew and Gemma Brown of Caldwell Construction. Those connections were already celebrating this week when they won the first Grade 1 of the Punchestown Festival with Mighty Potter.

Joey Logan, Caldwell Construction’s representative, said: “Fil Dor came out of Cheltenham very well and he’s very good now. He ran a great race in the Triumph and kept going to the line. He seems well. We’d love a bit of rain, that would definitely help but we’re looking forward to the race.

“After Mighty Potter won the Grade 1 for Andy and Gemma on Tuesday, it’s already been a great week for them but Fil Dor will hopefully run his usual race and if he does, he’ll be in there boxing.”

Speaking ahead of the Punchestown Festival, Patrick Mullins said of Vauban: “The good ground will help and he is a horse with a lot of speed. It turned into a bit of a sprint in the Triumph Hurdle and that probably played to his strengths but for him to be able to miss the last and be able to pick up and run away from the other two, I think he is better than your average Triumph Hurdle winner. Hopefully he can back that up but I can’t see any reason why the track or the ground wouldn’t play to his strengths.”

The field in the Ballymore Champion Four Year Old Hurdle is completed by Vauban’s stable companion, Il Etait Temps, Hms Seahorse, who was fourth in the Fred Winter for Paul Nolan, the Limerick maiden winner Man O Work for local trainer Paul Fahey and Innatendue for Naas-born trainer John McConnell.

The final day of the Punchestown Festival will begin with the Dooley Insurance Cross Country Chase at 2.35pm and finish with the ever popular Have The Conversation - Say Yes To Organ Donation Punchestown Charity Race which has attracted a full field of 25 runners.