Runners at Naas for our star columnist on Sunday while he reflects on a successful midweek trip to Thurles too.
We had a fantastic day at Thurles on Wednesday.
Colreevy marked herself as one of the best novice chasing mares in the country by winning the Coolmore N.H. Sires Kew Gardens Irish EBF Mares Novice Chase which opened up the chance to go to Cheltenham.
She jumps very well and obviously has lots of stamina which puts her in the picture for some of the top novice chases.
Paul set Allaho a good task in the Horse & Jockey Hotel Chase despite there only being seven runners and the Gigginstown horses kept him honest.
He jumped for fun and stayed on well while Elimay ran a cracker in second. She came out of the pack to challenge going to the last but that showed Allaho was just idling in front.
He picked up and went away from her when the competition came. Coming back to this trip suited him and while I wouldn’t rule out going for the Gold Cup, at the moment I think connections probably prefer the Ryanair.
Elimay looks like she’s one for the new mares’ chase at Cheltenham off the back of that, while it was great to see Aubrey McMahon win his first race over hurdles aboard Eurotiep.
He did everything right, kept the horse balanced and running, while Eurotiep marked himself out as being above average too.
We’ve been busy this week preparing for the Dublin Racing Festival and hopefully plenty of our big guns, including Appreciate It and Chacun Pour Soi, will be heading there.
I’ll have a full guide to them next week but here are my thoughts on the runners this weekend.
Naas Sunday
13:15 Bachasson
He’s won twice this season at Clonmel and Punchestown and while it’s a tough assignment coming back to this trip, ratings wise he has a chance in a hot little race. If he was in the first three it would be a good achievement for him. I just hope conditions might bring his stamina into play.
13:45 El Barra
He disappointed at Christmas but if he comes back to something like he showed us when winning his bumper at Thurles then he’d have a chance here. I’d like to see him back at that level but he has to put that last run behind him.
13:45 Arctic Warrior
He’s second reserve. He’s closely related to Arctic Fire and with that pedigree might want better ground.
14:15 Glens Of Antrim
She should run well and has a good chance in this. She just needs to improve her jumping but schools well at home and if she translates that to the track she could certainly find enough to win this.
16:15 Billaway
He won well at Down Royal last time and I’d be hoping he could confirm the ability he showed in that run. This is another stepping stone for him hopefully to the Foxhunters at Cheltenham, a race he was second in last year.
16:15 Dragon D'Estruval
He ran quite well when third in his point in December. His old rating of 147 in England would give him a reasonable chance against these hunter chasers. He might be another for Cheltenham.
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