IMAGINE, if you will, a time when Punchestown raced but once a year.

And all the races on both spring days were staged over those daunting banks and walls for which Punchestown was justly famous.

It was seen as a proving ground, a shop window for Grand National aspirants. Back in the day Punchestown had not yet built racecourse stabling. From 1924 Naas racecourse provided the solution. Runners were stabled there overnight and walked over to Punchestown.

Spencer Freeman, public relations wizard for the Irish Hospital Sweepstakes and later for the revolutionary Irish Sweeps Derby, conveyed the flavour of Punchestown preparations all those years ago. He was then living in Ardenode, home today to Sean and Bernadine Mulryan of Ballymore Properties.

“By mid-1939 we had got settled in at Ardenode. I had several hunters, a few likely ‘chasers and three brood mares.

“Ardenode is one of the best known demesnes in Ireland. Before Dr and Mrs John Geraghty came there it was owned by Colonel Honner, chief of the Royal Engineers in the British Army garrison, stationed seven miles away at the Curragh Camp in Co. Kildare.

“Colonel Honner was dedicated to horses, breeding and training with some success on the flat and under National Hunt Rules. According to legend he made liberal use of ‘fatigue’ parties from the Curragh Camp to build walls and make ditches at Ardenode.

“He built a series of banks, exact replicas of those on the famous Punchestown Racecourse, a few miles away. The Ardenode course, with an internal circuit, measured two miles. I kept up the tradition, originated by Honner, of opening it up a month before Punchestown Races for all to use for schooling horses.

“In April, 1939, about 30 Punchestown horses, in addition to my own, were schooled in Ardenode. We gave hot beverages and refreshments to their owners, trainers and riders, among whom were Cecil and Aubrey Brabazon, Bob Fetherstonhaugh, Joe Osborne, Paddy Sleator, Francis Flood, Dick Hoey, Baron de Robeck, Michael and Con Collins, Ken Urquhart, Emanuel and Willie Parkinson, Charlie Weld, Dr Purcell, Peter and Bobby Coonan, Captain Graham and the now famous Paddy Prendergast.”

Paid dividends

That 1939 dress rehearsal certainly paid dividends for Ken Urquhart, Paddy Sleator, Joe Osborne and Bob Fetherston’, while Paddy Prendergast - later renowned as a flat trainer – took the opening Tickell Challenge Cup with Outfit, ridden by his brother M.C. ‘Red’ Prendergast. However, it was Paddy Sleator who carried off the prize that mattered most to Kildaremen – the Bishopscourt Cup.

Confined to horses the property of bona fide Kildare farmers – without whose support hunting could not continue in the county – the Bishopscourt Cup had long become the local Grand National, Gold Cup and Grand Pardubice rolled into one.

For those qualified to participate, the Bishopscourt Cup was the Blue Riband of steeplechasing. Its roll of honour illuminates the very backbone of the Punchestown Festival, now the biggest corporate gig in the Irish social calendar.

A trawl through that roll of honour merely confirms the almost mystical significance of Bishopscourt Cup success.

‘Old’ Harry Beasley of Eyrefield House rode Pickpocket to victory in 1880. His brother John followed suit the next year. Harry took over again in 1883 and 1885, the latter in the presence of Edward, Prince of Wales. Indeed, the Beasley family held sway at Punchestown through three generations. Bobby Beasley, three times Irish champion jump jockey, rode many winners there for Paddy Sleator during the 1950s.

Park fences

A sea change occured in 1960, as Raymond Smith recorded in his Peerless Punchestown – 150 Years of Glorious Tradition. ‘The introduction of the bush fence course did not happen without a deal of controversy. Indeed, it aroused deep passion and intense debate between the “traditionalists” and the advocates of change.

“Major de Burgh recalled a famous meeting in the courthouse in Naas. In the course of his speech to a packed house, he ended by saying that any reasonable man would have to accept his arguments in favour of change.

“That brought one response: ‘When you say any reasonable man, you mean anyone who agrees with you!’ But the advocates of change carried the day – and Punchestown never looked back.”

Raymond Smith lived just long enough to see his book published in the spring of 2000.

Hurdle races

In 1961 a new course allowed hurdle races to be run, a prelude to bumper racing. Much later Punchestown staged flat meetings.

The standard of horses competing under NH rules was transformed overnight. Moreover, sponsorship was attracted, further improving incentive to owners and trainers to vie for added prize money. From two days a year up to 1960, Punchestown raced a total of 21 days in 2024, the old two-day meeting expanded to five.

Tradition is preserved nonetheless by the retention of such as the Ladies Cup, three miles over the banks course. Also surviving is the La Touche Cup, over four miles and 31 fences.

For those who think such events an anomaly, the La Touche attracted no fewer than 14 runners in 2024. The winner was 28/1 shot Singing Banjo, owned by John Patrick Walsh from Gorey, Co Wexford and both trained and ridden by his son, Barry John.

British runners

From being a strictly domestic affair, confined to Irish horses especially schooled for bank racing, Punchestown began to attract English runners, pioneered by Newmarket trainer Harry Thomson Jones. He accounted for three Martin Mahony Champion Novice Hurdles in the 1960s.

Other raiders to carry off those goodies included Fred Rimell, David Nicholson and Oliver Sherwood. Later still came Nicky Henderson, Richard Fahey and Nigel Twiston-Davies. Last year saw trainers Tom Lacey and Nigel Twiston-Davies take prizes back to Britain, a far cry from the nine English raiders successful in 1999.

Willie Mullins made sure of that, accounting for nine of the 32 races. Mullins had a record 19 winners at Punchestown in 2021 but his Festival ammunition was reduced last season as he sent more runners to Britain where he was the first Irish trainer to win the jump trainers’ title since the late, great Vincent O’Brien in 1952-’53 and 1953-’54.