Rest of the card

RACE sponsor Steve Parkin enjoyed a victory to cherish as his Jersey Stakes hero Space Traveller enhanced the strong record of English horses in the Group 2 Clipper Logistics Boomerang Stakes.

Parkin part-owned the 2017 winner of this race, Suedois (fourth this year), but this time he saw his familiar grey Clipper Logistics colours carried to victory as Space Traveller was delivered with a perfectly timed run by Billy Lee.

Another Irish Champions Weekend winner for Richard Fahey and a fourth raider to win this race in six years, Space Traveller had to challenge from widest of all turning in. This mattered little though as the 13/2 chance nailed compatriot Matterhorn in the last few strides. The winning rider was yet another senior jockey to be referred on to the I.H.R.B. for a whip breach.

“We rode him like that at Royal Ascot when he won the Jersey Stakes. I said to ride him cold but when you go for home bring him wide and just send him because he’ll keep finding for you,” reflected Parkin. “Last year when he won his first two races as a two-year-old we thought he was an absolute aeroplane but then he went off the boil a little bit. He’s come back better this year and stepping him up in trip has worked wonders.”

The favourite Lancaster House was reported to be lame after finishing seventh.

Kastasa’s understated yet unrelenting rise up the ranks continued into the €150,000 Irish Stallion Farms EBF Petingo Handicap which looks to have paved the way for the Aga Khan-owned filly to move up to stakes level.

Kastasa and Andy Slattery won the Irish Stallion Farms EBF Petingo Handicap for trainer Dermot Weld \ Healy Racing

As she looked to defy a near stone hike in the ratings for wins at Sligo and the Curragh last month, this filly was burdened with a stall 18 draw which meant that saw was caught on the outside for the duration of the near one-mile-five-furlong trip.

However, apprentice Andy Slattery, who was notching up the most lucrative success of his career, had an extremely willing partner in Kastasa.

She first dug deep to first collar the progressive Trossachs and had that little bit in reserve late on to hold the oncoming favourite Buildmeupbuttercup by a neck.

“She’s a big filly who has progressed all the time and she has the potential to compete at stakes level which is why I’ve given her an entry in the Loughbrown Stakes later this month,” stated Weld.

“She’ll be very comfortable going a mile and three-quarters or even two miles and I think next year is when she will realise her potential.”

Success for Current Option

The decision to part with 85,000gns for Current Option (11/2) at the Tattersalls July Sale looked bold then and inspired now as the Adrian McGuinness inmate followed up his second in the Cambridgeshire by landing the Irish Stallion Farms EBF Sovereign Path Handicap.

After racing on the pace from the outset of this seven-furlong affair, the Ronan Whelan-ridden Camelot gelding sustained his effort all the way to the line and fended off the strong-finishing Black Magic Woman by a neck, with Ice Cold In Alex the same distance away in third. The winner is owned by McGuinness’ yard sponsor Bart O’Sullivan, James, Mark and Dave Dooley and Shamrock Thoroughbreds.

“He was maybe unlucky not to win the Cambridgeshire and he’s a good horse, possibly a blacktype horse in the making,” declared the trainer. “He is entered in the Concorde Stakes at Tipperary next month and that is an option but he could be sold too.

“We gelded him after buying him and he’s turned inside out since then.”

Current Option and Ronan Whelan win for trainer Ado McGuinness \ Healy Racing