Frankie John runs in the two-mile-two-furlong beginners’ chase on Tuesday and hopefully that should be exciting. He had some good runs in smart novice hurdles through the winter, and he’s obviously been down the point-to-point route originally, so he knows the job well over fences.

“Tyson Fury ran well at Killarney last time when second over hurdles. He has entries in the Connacht Hotel Qualified Riders Handicap on Monday, as well as a maiden hurdle [over two miles and six furlongs] on Wednesday. Mickie Angel has a few options over fences later in the week too.

Meriden has been unbelievable, a revelation. There’s a race at Deauville that we have under consideration for her next month, but I’ve also stuck her in the Listed Corrib Fillies Stakes at Galway on Thursday. We had said we wouldn’t go to Galway but I wanted to give her the option and I’ll have a chat with connections.

“Hopefully we’ll be busy through the week; there are a few horses in flat handicaps and we’ll run a nice horse in the bumper on Thursday called Macdonagh Park. He was an expensive store [at €110,000] and we still think a lot of him. He’s by Walk In The Park and was second on his last start in a point-to-point before running in a Punchestown Festival bumper [sixth of 21 runners]. Our horses have been in good form so hopefully they can continue along those lines.”

“We’ll have a few in the mix for Galway. Ballystone won a handicap hurdle at the meeting last year and he could go back for a two-mile-six-furlong beginners’ chase on Friday this time around - the same race that we won with Intense Approach at Galway 12 months ago. Alternatively, he’s got an entry in a listed handicap hurdle over a similar trip on Saturday. He had been off the track for a while before he ran at the Punchestown Festival and probably ran quite well to a point before blowing up.

“Intense Approach will run in the Galway Blazers Handicap Chase on Friday. We were very happy with his run on the flat at Bellewstown the other day; that actually might open an avenue to explore further with him.

“We had a filly called Aquilla Star finish second at Ballinrobe earlier this week. She has course form, having finished second in a race there towards the back-end of last season, and we’ll aim her for one of the three-year-old handicaps next week. She’d have a chance.”

“I’m looking forward to running Drumgill on Sunday in the two-mile-two-furlong handicap chase. I think he’d have won at Killarney the other day but for a mistake at the second last in a handicap chase there.

“Hopefully Ad Caelum will go for the listed handicap hurdle on Saturday, if she gets in at the bottom. As it stands, if the top-weight [Flooring Porter] runs, we’ll be 4lb wrong at the weights so we’ll see what happens. I thought another horse would bring her into the race last time at Kilbeggan but that one didn’t show up at all, so it didn’t work out for us. We were left in no man’s land, but that was my fault from the instructions I gave. She was good when she won over three miles the time before at Kilbeggan.

“I also run a very exciting young bumper horse during the week. Reafadda is a townland near Hollyford [Co Tipperary] and he’s named after there. I actually had a horse called that name years before and he won at the Galway Festival [back in 2013] for us. He’ll probably go for the bumper on Sunday. I have some really good bumper horses and he’s the pick of them.”

“We got a great thrill out of Galway last year when Nans View won the feature race on the Friday. She was our only runner of the week in 2025 and we’ll probably only have one runner again this year. If we could repeat the dose, it’d be something else.

“If a bit of rain falls, it’ll be a help to Granite Bay [in the Connacht Hotel Handicap on Monday]. In fairness to the team at Galway, it sounds like they’ve put a fair bit of watering on anyway. He ran a cracker the other day at the Curragh when he was second in a handicap over a mile and six furlongs. That trip is probably a bit short of his best - two miles around Galway should suit him. I think the race conditions suit him and he’s been around Galway before, finished second. David Doyle will hopefully ride him.”