Pure Steel has connections dreaming of bigger days ahead

He struck the third last here the last day and they were gone then. Mark said there was no point then as he wouldn’t get to them. He was a different horse today. It was a grand, handy, little field today. Mark said he handled that ground. I think he’s a nice horse. He’ll win a lot of races and he jumps well. It wasn’t a bad race but you have to go out and do it. I don’t know where we’ll go next but hopefully Fairyhouse for the WillowWarm or back here.

Soldier In Milan marching towards Cheltenham

It was a nice performance. He’s still a bit green and babyish, I suppose he hasn’t had too much racing under his belt. It was nice to see when Paul ranged up, and Donagh sat down on his back, that there seemed to be plenty there. Hopefully it’s onwards and upwards. He’s a big brute and we said we’d crack on and go chasing for fear he got injured and you’d be losing a year over hurdles. This is his game, three miles and staying tests and soft ground. He fences very well for a relative novice. He has an entry in the Brown Advisory, and I think I’ve entered him in the two novice handicaps at Cheltenham as well so we’ve plenty of options. We’ll mull over Cheltenham strongly.

My Immortal relishes heavy ground to cause 40/1 shock

We ran him in Galway in October and it’s usually bottomless there but I ran three horses there and they all came back jarred. I ran him back in Leopardstown and the ground was grand for horses that want good ground, but he just didn’t like it, minded himself and pulled himself up. Last year we had a couple of horses, him and Hgranca De Thaix, that were never right. The way that he’s been working at home I was expecting a big run from him today. All we needed was the ground. He’d stay any trip. I’ll probably enter him for the Midlands National. He’s going to get 10lb for that so that would make him 135 and he’d probably get in off bottom weight. We are going to run out of places for soft ground fairly soon. I might stick him in the Leinster National as well, that closes next week. He could be one for the Welsh National next year. Finny gave him an unbelievable ride, he got him into some rhythm. It’s great to have him in the yard, Sean rides most of them but we try to give Finny as many chances as we can.

Hood helps Heads Up get back on track

Phew! Obviously everything went wrong the last day. The delay didn’t help but the way he behaved delay or no delay he would have blown his chance. The frustrating thing is that he’s a very placid horse at home and is not keen or anything. All his schooling has been in behind but if you get into a row with him, you’ll lose. It’s great to get him back and Danny gave him a lovely ride from the front, he didn’t set him alight too much. I wouldn’t say he’s had an easy race, but he would have enjoyed it and that’s the main thing. We just wanted to get him back on track. Where we go, I don’t know. There will be big decisions to be talked about, but they are nice decisions. He’s in both the Supreme and the Turners. He’s probably a two-and-a-half miler but with his exuberance we decided to come back to two and he obviously settled a lot better. This was a Listed race today so it’s obviously good to get it, in itself. I thought he actually ran remarkably well the last day to last pretty much into the home straight given that he was like a wild animal. It was like he didn’t see his hurdles; he was kicking them out of the way. He was running around and he was keen for whatever reason. Cheltenham is an atmospheric place and for whatever reason he just didn’t handle it. We had the hood on today and it obviously helped. It’s a worry because we’re going to be going to either Cheltenham, Aintree, P

Ksar Fatal completes a double for Barry Connell

He won well. He’s just a green horse, and it’s his first time over hurdles. He hasn’t run for nine months. He was working with the slow horse that won the National Trial! I don’t know what that tells you. He’s an exciting horse. He’ll have two more runs over hurdles this year and then we’ll go jumping a fence. He’s very good to jump. He’s by a very good sire, Buck’s Boum. I think what we’re looking at is the Grade 2 in Fairyhouse in seven weeks’ time. If everything went well there, he could come back to Punchestown for the 2m4f Grade 1. That’ll be him then under wraps until he goes jumping a fence next year. Willie’s horse was second in Cork, and the winner came out and won a Grade 3 in Gowran yesterday. If it was a month ago you might be thinking about going to Cheltenham but for a horse that is going chasing, I don’t think we need to be going there. There are some lovely targets at home.

Chase The Moon scores again at 33/1

'He's a nice horse, a big baby' - Elliott on bumper winner Soul Asylum

He’s a nice horse, a big galloper. He’s a next year horse really. You might see him in Fairyhouse or somewhere like that for a bumper. He wouldn’t be a horse that would be travelling to Cheltenham; he’s a big baby. If you watch his point-to-point the penny only really dropped, and he got galloping, late on. It wasn’t ideal to make the running today, but we had to go on as there was no gallop.