TIMES were quite a bit slower on the flat on day two than day one at Galway. Uradel’s was the best winning time performance (98) on the Monday at Ballybrit, but runner-up Limini gave him weight and comes out at 104.

Even better was to come from another Rich Ricci horse the following day, when Riven Light defied a welter burden in the Colm Quinn BMW Handicap, registering a 111 timefigure which suggests he has a future in listed races and possibly even better than that. There will be few, if any, better efforts in a handicap this Irish flat season.

At a much lower level, Truffles returned to her best when winning the concluding seven-furlong handicap on Tuesday with a timefigure of 87.

Easy Game and Pakora both put up 130-rated novice hurdling performances on time. It should be remembered that jumps figures are traditionally on a scale something like 35 higher than the flat and that the leading novices come Cheltenham time are usually capable of running into the 150s.

The supporting races at Goodwood on Tuesday saw a quartet of useful winning performances, starting with Alfarris (103) in a rough opener, followed by Watan (93) in a promising two-year-old maiden, Under The Covers (104) in a five-furlong older-horse handicap and finally Move Swiftly (99) in the mile fillies’ handicap.

Watan, a son of the first-season sire Toronado, looks a colt we will hear more of, though some of his rivals got in each others’ way in behind and the field was not especially strung out.