Rest of card

PARIS is calling for Jessica Harrington after Barnavara proved untouchable in the Group 2 Moyglare “Jewels” Blandford Stakes - benefiting from a cracking, front-running ride by Shane Foley.

Ger Lyons and Paddy Twomey saddled the standout form contenders, Red Letter (11/8 favourite) and One Look (3/1), but neither could lay a glove on Alpha Racing’s ultra-consistent three-year-old.

Sent off at 6/1 after being safely held in third behind Red Letter here last time, she proved a different proposition over a furlong further - excelling at the 10-furlong trip for the second time this season (won Group 3 Jannah Rose Stakes at Naas in June).

The six-furlong debut winner at this venue as a two-year-old has only finished out of the first four once in her life and wasn’t for catching once sent on by Foley, beating a running-on One Look by three and a half lengths, with Red Letter a further two and a quarter lengths back in third.

Harrington had this to say: “She’s a fantastic filly and is improving all the time. She’s a very big filly. Every bit of rain that fell helped her; she will go on softer ground.

“She will go to Longchamp now on Arc weekend for the Prix de l’Opera. She’s won a listed race, a Group 3 and now a Group 2, so it’s the natural way to go for a Group 1 next. It’s great that so many of the syndicate are here - they get a great kick out of it.”

A dream weekend for Karl Burke and Clifford Lee got even better when Alparslan bolted up in the €250,000 Tattersalls Ireland Super Auction Sales Stakes - the duo’s third winner of the 2025 Irish Champions Festival.

The market confidence that saw Mohamed Saeed Al Shehhi’s Dandy Man colt sent off 5/4 favourite for a 16-runner sales event proved well placed, as he beat Danny McLoughlin’s Magny Cours by three and a half lengths - ahead of a luckless Blingy’s Sister, trained by Hugo Palmer, in third.

Alparslan was bought by Federico Barberini for €75,000 at the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale from Coole House Farm.

“This is a lovely colt,” said Burke. “We purposely left him for this race after he won his maiden. He’d improved a lot on that, and we’ll throw him into blacktype races now and see how high we can take him.

“It was the same at Leicester over seven furlongs when he won on his debut, he was doing his best work at the end. He’s big and workmanlike at home, he’s not a speed horse, but you never know until you get those horses onto the track and see what is under the engine.

“He could go for the Horris Hill at the back-end of the season at Newbury. He obviously handles a bit of cut in the ground as well.”

Burke arrived with seven runners at the Irish Champions Festival and emerged with three winners, three Group 1 thirds and a top-level fifth. There was not the same strength in numbers from his British training colleagues.

“There are some great trainers over here and some great horses, but you’ve got to take them on and you should never be afraid of getting beat,” said Burke.

“I don’t understand why a lot more UK trainers don’t give it a go. There is good prize money, particularly this weekend. It’s been great for us down the years. I love travelling horses and like the challenge of taking on the great trainers, whether it be here or in France or wherever. It’s all part of life - you have to give it a go.”

THE visitors went close to notching a fifth winner of the weekend when Tony Montana (Michael Bell) and well-backed 10/11 favourite Crown Of Oaks (William Haggas) finished second and third in the concluding €150,000 Irish Stallion Farms EBF Northfields Handicap.

Instead, however, it was one of the standout operators of the 2025 Irish Champions Festival, Johnny Murtagh, who capped a stellar weekend’s work when improving filly Shaool took her form to a new level by running out a ready two-and-a-half-length winner under Ben Coen at 11/2.

Switched off early from stall 15 and brought through nicely to challenge approaching the final two furlongs, the Broadfield Group Syndicate-owned four-year-old proved she was still ahead of the handicapper off 85 in notching Murtagh’s third winner of the weekend.

“This filly is improving a lot,” said the locally-based trainer.

“She loves soft ground and had some really solid runs. She’s been going very well at home. Ben gave her a beautiful ride, rode her really well and she just came beautifully in the last furlong and a half.

“It’s great for the lads involved. Some of these guys have come home all the way from America to see her run today. They’ve been part of the syndicate but this is the first time they’ve been home this year, so it’s great when it works out like that.”

TRAINER Pat Foley has ambitions to increase his string of flat horses and a 50/1 shock success in the opening €150,000 Irish Stallion Farms EBF Bold Lad Sprint Handicap with Tango Flare will do his prospects no harm.

Victory for the Ray McSharry-owned stalwart represented the biggest that Foley has enjoyed on the level so far in his career - taking advantage of an 8lb lower mark for the six-year-old than when third in last year’s renewal.

Luke McAteer, back aboard for the first time in over a year, finished with a half a length to spare over the ultra-admirable top-weight Big Gossey in second.

Foley said: “I was very worried about the ground. If the forecast had been right [and more rain came], I’m not sure he would have run at all because he’s not the same on soft ground. He ran a cracker in this race last year and you were hoping he’d put his best foot forward. If he did, we thought he’d be thereabouts.

“Six furlongs is his trip; he doesn’t get seven and he’s not sharp enough for five. That makes him hard to place, when he’s up around the 100-mark. He raced off 9st 1lb today, and that’s the first time in a while he hasn’t been right at the very top of the weights in one of these handicaps. This was the most valuable race he’s run in all season, so it definitely was his main target.”

He added: “We just have a handful of flat horses in training. We’re finding it harder to get those flat ones in when we’re probably known as a National Hunt yard - we find it easier to get the jumpers in. I’d love to be busier in the summer on the flat and it’d be great to have 20 flat horses along with 30 jumpers. Today won’t do us any harm.”