IN contrast to events across the Irish Sea, the meetings at Fairyhouse on Saturday, and Navan and Thurles last Sunday, were bathed in glorious winter sunshine.

So it was that it was possible to witness the chasing debut of Yorkhill at the first-named course and the continued rise of Death Duty at the second-named course without resorting to guesswork.

Yorkhill was impressive, without doing anything sensational on the clock, the bare time being worthy of a 129 timefigure (though with any amount in hand). Indeed, the novice that won the other chase on Fairyhouse’s card, A Genie In Abottle, ran faster in relative terms - a 145 timefigure - while paying a compliment to Martello Tower (also 145 timefigure) who had beaten him the time before.

It looks as if Death Duty is one of Ireland’s best hurdling prospects, but his win in the Grade 2 Navan Novice Hurdle seemed rather workmanlike to these eyes, for all that the resulting 146 timefigure is one of the best in this division so far this season.

Death Duty’s time was only fractionally quicker than Automated’s in winning a handicap 35 minutes later, admittedly carrying 10lb less, and one suspects there are a few other novices around who could beat Monalee by under four lengths, as did Death Duty.

Death Duty won’t be carrying my money at a short price ante-post at this stage for the Albert Bartlett at the Cheltenham Festival.

Cilaos Emery was easily fastest of the four Navan hurdle winners from the third-last flight (around 10 lengths quicker than Death Duty proved to be) and still recorded a handy timefigure of 128 when winning the opener on what was his debut in this sphere. The Willie Mullins-trained youngster looks a useful prospect.