Going - Good to Yielding. Overcast and breezy
Jackpot Pool - €20,846.72 Dividend - €8,867.80 Winning Units - 2. Placepot Pool - €31,181.93 Dividend - €40.70 Winning Units - 534.27. Pick Six Pool - €17,238.40 Not Won. Carried forward to Naas on Sunday 4th November. Days Aggregate - €172,861.50 Last Year
Sublime makes perfect start to hurdling career
We think he is a nice horse. He'll come on a tonne from the run, you could see he was behind the bridle the whole way and kept picking up. We think he could be okay. He hasn't been on grass at all. He'll go on anything if its not the two extremes - bottomless heavy or too quick. Bryan (Cooper) says it is beautiful ground there. You can't stress enough that this is the first time the horses are getting on grass so I thought it was a good performance. Fairyhouse looks the obvious place to go with him. Chris (Jones) deserves every bit of luck he gets as he invests a lot into the game. He's a big owner.
Drama aplenty as Brace justifies favouritism
He's a northern horse, we bought him off Warren Ewing and he came very highly recommended. He won a bumper by a long way here. We kept him a novice until this season. He didn't run up to his par at Punchestown but we think he is a nice horse. He wants further than two miles, two and a half I'd say. The bit of rain helped him and he jumped great. It was a funny race with that loose one all over the place. The best horse won. I'd say we will try and get into a novice hurdle somewhere before Christmas - there's a couple of them there in Navan over more of a trip I'd imagine.
Spear gets back on track in Billecart-Salmon
Sure look he was deserving of a good pot, he's been consistent and ran a lovely race in the Cesarewitch in England three weeks ago. Prior to that he was second in a (Cesarewitch) trial. He wasn't beaten too far by two of Willie's (Mullins) there the last day and ran a lovely race. He has been consistent all his life and has won plenty of good pots. He's a right little horse and he's been magic. Every year he just keeps doing jobs like that so we'll keep tipping away with him in both codes.
Road impresses in Down Royal feature
I was sort of wondering what was going to go wrong because he was going so easy. When he took that enormous leap at the fourth last or fifth last he just jumped onto the bridle. He (Flanagan) said he was off the bridle just doing nothing behind and only jumping ordinary but he said when he picked him up he just went onto it straight away and he latched on and he was just cantering from there to the line really. We knew he was in tremendous form but we have never brought him to the races as heavy - he's about 20 kilos heavier than he was at his best over the summer. The guys that were looking after him were fully confident that he was 100 percent, I was a little bit shaky because he was that bit heavy. We felt last year in this race that we lost it because the race in Punchestown sort of half killed him because it was only two weeks before it. He was a little tired. He jumped a lot straighter today and was very uncomplicated and was very good. Its onward and upwards. I presume it will be Christmas, I would imagine it would be Leopardstown and then all roads lead to Cheltenham for the Gold Cup I would presume. Whether he would run in the Irish Gold Cup we will see.
Falcon completes a treble for Flanagan & Meade
It has always been a lucky enough meeting for me since its first inception really. It has always been good to us. He's a lovely horse and he's a very genuine horse that has been there or thereabouts. He won the Kerry National and deserved to win a race like that. We learned a few things about him and he's better when he doesn't run too often and when there is a bit of a dig in the ground. He'll be entered in the big race at Christmas and he'll be entered in the King George and all those races because he does stay three miles. He's entered in the race at Newbury which is now the Ladbroke Trophy and was the Hennessy - he will probably end up with too much weight in it. If the likes of Coneygree or something like that was in it then it might be a possibility. I wouldn't be keen to go over there to carry top weight. We'll give him all the time he needs. He's a bit lazy when he gets to the front. He is a good horse - he was just touched off in a Liverpool Hurdle and was going real well in a Grade Two in Newbury a couple of years ago and fell at the second-last.
He Knows My Name springs 20/1 surprise
It's brilliant to have a winner at the festival and I'm delighted for mum and dad. She probably needed her comeback run in Downpatrick, she's never as good over hurdles but we had to start somewhere. We knew coming here she was in great form and there was a few quid on her each way at tasty prices!. This had been the plan all along from the spring time. I didn't really want to touch her mark of 105 because I was just glad to see her in the bottom of the handicap. She's in Market Rasen for a Listed chase on Thursday and we'll see how she comes out of this and we'll go from there. We were very disappointed with her early on in her career. We had her entered in the Land Rover Bumper as a four-year-old and then we gave her two years off and it was the best thing we ever did. She's had so many niggly problems, not very much wrong with her. If we could sneak into the bottom of a bigger handicap over three miles on testing ground we will look at that. She won in Cork on bottomless ground.
Elliott doubles-up with impressive Malone Road
It has been a great couple of days. He's smart, we were happy with what he was doing coming here today. It wasn't ideal having to make the running but we just said we would keep it simple. He gallops and he is a nice horse. You just love the way he quickened going across the road to the line. Cheveley Park were good to buy him and send me a good few horses. Hopefully this can be a good one. He probably would be better (on softer ground) but listen good horses go on most ground. He'll go for a winners' bumper somewhere, something like Navan.
