AFTER a campaign which began with a maiden success at this track and has since featured a series of honourable runs against the luminaries of his generation, Fort Myers picked up a deserved stakes race success in the Listed BoyleSports Irish EBF Star Appeal Stakes.

Donnacha O’Brien was on board the Coventry Stakes fourth who was sent off the evens favourite as he dropped down in grade following a fourth in last month’s Champagne Stakes at Doncaster. The son of War Front looked to revel in the switch back to Polytrack and when he was deftly switched out to make his challenge early in the straight he responded well.

He moved to the front early in the last furlong and he accounted for the previous stakes winner Justifier by a length. This race has produced a Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf winner in Hit It A Bomb and several others who have shown up well in that contest and that Santa Anita race could now be the target for this Ballydoyle inmate.

Donnacha O’Brien’s sole success of the night came in response to a Colin Keane double which began when Brunelle, who had run very respectably at Group 3 level in late August, won the Irish Stallion Farms EBF Race.

An absence stretching back to April counted against the trail blazing George Cornelius and he gave best inside the distance where Keane produced the Anamoine Ltd-owned daughter of Kodiac to lead. At the line, the 2/1 favourite had a length and a quarter to spare over Phase After Phase and Ger Lyons reported that the final of the Foran Series would be next for the winner. However, the trainer expressed reservations as to how his charge would cope with slow ground and the seven-furlong trip at Naas.

Keane and Lyons were also successful with the Vincent Gaul-owned Leadership Race (9/1) in the seven-furlong nursery. This son of Brazen Beau showed his disappointing effort at Fairyhouse last month to be all wrong as he came with a steady challenge from off the pace to defeat Spirit Of Sahara by a length and a quarter. This victory ensured that the winner would be retained next season as opposed to going to the horses in training sales.

Keane could easily have made it an opening race treble in the claiming maiden but the line arrived a stride or two too soon for his mount Marmolata who came out the wrong side of a three-way photo which gave the verdict to the Adrian McGuinness-trained Pocotaligo (7/2). A fortnight after being claimed for €10,000 by his owners, Genesis Thoroughbreds, this 71-rated gelding got home by a short-head under Shane Foley after edging out Royal Highness on the line.