IT was good to see that half of the races at the Route Hunt point-to-point outside Portrush last Saturday were won by northern-trained horses but, with a bit of luck, there could well have been six winners for local handlers.

The successful trio were Karen McNeilly’s charge Shumaker (Mark O’Hare) in the five-year-old geldings’ maiden, One Cool Clarkson trained by Neil McKnight for his wife Christene (breeder of the Clerkenwell gelding) in the winners of three and Billie-Jo Irwin’s Ballyhowne (Ben Crawford) who claimed the older geldings’ maiden for the Stuart Crawford yard.

A mistake at the last possibly cost Warren Ewing’s Brace Yourself victory in the opening four-year-old maiden as he only went down by three-quarters of a length to fellow debutant Weakfield.

Mark O’Hare was on board the son of Mahler and the Co Down farrier also had to settle for second place in the mares’ maiden where Questionation, trained by Gerald Quinn for Kieran McKay, was beaten a neck by Absainte who ran in the colours of the northern-based Smile Says It All Syndicate.

The reigning The Irish Field national champion Barry O’Neill, who rode both Absainte and One Cool Clarkson, just missed out on a treble when the David Christie-trained Sabremont, in the colours of local owner John Hegarty, failed by a neck to hold off the well-timed challenge of Derek O’Connor on Jim Dreaper’s charge Sizing Coal in the open.

CERTIFICATE

Among the latest batch of hunter certificates lodged at the Turf Club was one for Christene McKnight’s Ballroomofromance, a four-year-old Mahler filly, while her brother Craig Bryson will be represented by the 2013 gelding Daario Naharis (by Winged Love).

Jerry Cosgrave had a busy time lodging certs including one for the gelding Loveinalamborghini, another four-year-old by Winged Love.

Brian Hamilton has a couple of four-year-olds ready to make their debuts for the Magill family, the Gold Well filly Lucys Gold and the French-bred Seven De Baune, a gelding by Tiger Groom.

Poignantly, among the certificates just lodged by Graham McKeever was one for the late Peggy Hagan’s Chosen Dream.

The news that the Iveaghs have rescheduled their cancelled Moira meeting to Saturday, December 2nd, will see the first half of the season in the northern region extended by two weeks.

Next Saturday, the Co Downs run at Loughbrickland where, at their first autumn meeting in 2001, there were eight races with the opening four and five-year-old mares’ maiden and the concluding older geldings’ maiden being divided.