THIS week’s racing headlines picked out the possibility of top horses coming from as far away as Japan to compete in the Group 1 races on Irish Champions Weekend. The creation of ICW last year was one of the success stories in Irish racing and it is an indication of where we now sit, attracting the world’s best to our racetracks. That’s the elite stuff.

Further down, there are many other areas to bring optimism that racing is moving in the right direction.