THE decision over whether to keep Samcro hurdling or send him over fences seemed to revolve around turning him into a champion hurdler now, or a Gold Cup horse further down the line.

Gigginstown plumped for the former, and he duly reappeared over two miles at Down Royal.

Sent off long odds-on, he travelled well behind Sharjah but lacked the tactical speed to quicken on the down-hill run and it fell to relative outsider Bedrock to take his scalp.

A disappointing run on the face of it, but the clock suggests that there’s good reason to be hopeful.

The pace was decent for a small-field, without being strong, but it still turned into a sprint turning for home which was unlikely to have proved Samcro’s long-suit given his ability over further than this trip.

When broken down, the sectionals were extremely good, however, with the race proving faster both to three-out and from three-out to the line than the useful Grade 3 two-mile mares hurdle’ won by Sancta Simona.

It’s also important to note that Samcro was making his seasonal reappearance against fresh, in-form horses (Sharjah had won the Galway Hurdle off 146, Bedrock had easily won a Grade 3 hurdle in a good time beating Wicklow Brave and Arctic Fire) and he was giving 8lbs and 5lbs to them respectively.

I’d awarded Samcro a peak-rating of 165 for his Ballymore win and his Down Royal run was only a few pounds shy off at 162. A replication of that run would see him thereabouts in a Champion Hurdle. Bedrock (158) has been sold to America and should be capable of winning Group-1 races across there, while Sharjah (146) ran to a respectable level which would look to be an accurate reflection of his ability.

Chasing was the primary focus at Down Royal on Saturday, with the three-mile Champion Chase as well as the Skymas Chase over the intermediate trip. The former was dominated by Gigginstown, who provided four runners, with the remaining two coming from Jessica Harrington’s stable.

Won by Road To Respect (171), the feature of the race was the brutal gallop (Timeform calculated the finishing speed at 93.8%) which saw the field well-strung out at the line.

Road To Respect ran fourth in the most recent Cheltenham Gold Cup, but this was a new personal best, and he looks an important cog in what already is a strong Irish contingent for the race.

Pace-wise, the Skymas Chase was an altogether tamer affair, the result being a relative speed test for Snow Falcon (153), Shattered Love (156, sex-adjusted) and Monalee (151) who filled the frame. Snow Falcon was, and probably is, the least of these in raw ability terms, but he was the most ready on the day and is a decent animal, somewhere below top-class. Shattered Love and Monalee were both carrying penalties here, and it showed, with them shaping like they’d improve for the experience.

Monalee, in particular, looked to blow up and you would expect to see a different horse on his next run.