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Like Navan yesterday, Leopardstown have done well to get their meeting on today, the track covered with snow on Friday afternoon, and conditions are sure to emphasise stamina, not least in the 4.35, the Willie Gibbons Celebrating 38 Years at Leopardstown Handicap Chase.
They have missed a trick in not calling this the Dublin National as it is being run over 3m4f, which is the longest race to be run at Leopardstown in my memory, and it should suit Pictures Of Home who was squeezed out at the wrong time on his last run at Fairyhouse behind Where’s Frankie, with whom he get a sizeable weight pull.
His trainer Ted Walsh has been having a fine season, 42% of individual runners winning a race in 2023/24, only six other handlers that have had at least five individual runners bettering that figure so far this campaign.
One of the others is Micheal McDonagh, four of his 10 individual runners winning in 2023/24, and while his BATTLE OF MIRBAT is coming off a pulled-up effort at Thurles, he has interesting claims in the feature - the QuinnBet Handicap Chase at 4.00.
He was an impressive winner in a lower-grade handicap chase over this track and trip on the same card last year, the Timeform timefigure strong and the form solid as he beat a couple of horses that have proved well suited by the course in Galon De Vauzelle and Super Citizen.
Another victory came at Wexford in June where he had subsequent Cheltenham winner Whacker Clan back in third and he is building up a strong record going left-handed, his form figures that way round reading: 832112.
Since that Wexford win, four of his five starts have come on right-handed tracks, the sole exception being at Naas in November where he finished second to a well-treated rival, and he has not always looked suited going that way around.
Despite this, he ran an excellent race at Cork in late November when things didn’t go his way, making a mistake at the second which caused him to lose his place and having to race very wide in the middle part of the race, getting outpaced after four out but rallying well to be beaten just over a length.
The way that race went suggested he could be well-treated while the form has worked out quite well, the third winning soon after and the fourth running well in a stronger handicap at the DRF.
His most recent run came at Thurles off a short break, but he never looked comfortable from an early stage, hanging left at points, and I am prepared to forgiving that as he runs back under conditions that look more suitable.
The rest of the card looks difficult though perhaps The Lucky Lobster can get involved in the Anton O’Toole Handicap Hurdle at 3.25.
He caught the eye coming from off the pace in what is often a competitive handicap low-grade handicap hurdle on Thyestes day, every trainer within a 50-mile radius of Gowran aiming their lesser types at the race given the card it is on, but his price has contracted overnight.
Published at 0910 GMT on 03/03/24
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