Going - Good To Yielding. Raining
Jackpot Pool - €271.13 Placepot Pool - €22,359.83 Dividend - €23.20 Winning Units - 672.39.
Joseph O'Brien's Royal Affair "quick and improving"
El Astronaute gives Quinn a winner on home soil
Aspen Belle makes all for easy Cork win
I felt going to Tipperary she was a little short (of work) so the gallop down the back straight didn't do her any harm!. She is highly strung and is difficult and only that my son Jack gets on so well with her that we wouldn't have got as far as we have. She obviously loves this place and we have her in at Sligo on Tuesday. It is a 0-70 fillies handicap and it is not ideal that she will be running with 10st on her back but I'd imagine the reaction she'll get from the handicapper will force out hands to run her. It was probably as safe ground as we could get away with and ideally we wanted the heavens to open tonight but it was lovely and safe and Killian said that was as good as she has ever been.
Mackqeez brings up Cork double for Lyons and Keane
It was very straightforward and he is rated 97 so you'd expect him to be winning his maiden like that. He hit a flat spot turning in and I thought 'what the hell' but Colin said to go further and said he ran to his rating,. I'd have gone a mile with him but Colin called it right and said to go 10 (furlongs). I take no credit for it as I'm lucky to be in the right place - Adrian (Keatley, previous trainer) found and sourced the horse and bought a cracking horse and has done a grand job with him and we've just brought him along quietly. It's not nice circumstances but that is horse racing. He is staying with me and I seem to be gathering Hong Kong-based owners at the minute, rather than selling to them. It has been 20-odd years of selling to them so it is nice to have it this way around. They are lovely horses to have and most trainers will train these horses to win and I am lucky with my team of horses at the minute.
Heffernan drops whip, wins another Derby
He added .Joseph thought he was strong enough and mature enough now to go up in trip and he was hoping he'd run well and
Ideal Pal attracts plenty of money and justifies the confidence
He was well in with the likes of Meryems Way and was crying out for a bit of give in the ground,. I was disappointed when I arrived that the rain hadn't come as his breed want heavyish ground. I was hoping for a good run but I don't know who got dug into him (price-wise). He'll make a lovely three year old hurdler and if somebody came with enough money he is for sale!
Wilderness pops up in the last for Murtagh at 20/1
She is big and had a lot of soundness issues. This year she hasn't shown us much but she is a big girl and is improving with every run and maybe she is just getting fit,. She is a low grader but hopefully there is another one in her. Sheikh Fahad had her after her breeze-up but she had a lot of soundness issues and he gave her to me. She looks like she will get a mile and one and wherever she gets into a race over a mile or a mile and one she'll go next.
