THERE was so much to savour when it came to last weekend’s Royal Bahrain Irish Champion Stakes.

A top-notch colt in Auguste Rodin returning to the peak of his powers, a one-off trainer in Aidan O’Brien reminding us of how he delivers the goods when the pressure is greatest, and a fascinating tactical battle that demanded jockeyship of the highest calibre – it all made for gripping viewing.

There might be double the number of Group 1s on day two of the newly-rebranded Irish Champions Festival than is the case on opening afternoon at Leopardstown, but few would dispute that the Irish Champion Stakes is the clear highlight of the entire weekend.

Year in, year out, this is the crown jewel of the 16 Irish Champions Festival races down for decision. It fully deserves to be treated as such.

However, in its current position in the weekend’s schedule of races, the Irish Champion Stakes is not being best served.

Come the end of race four on day one last Saturday – marking just the quarter mark of the entire weekend – Leopardstown’s two Group 1s had come and gone for the year, and it felt as though the air had gone out of the balloon on track to a certain extent.

The team at Leopardstown work hard to cultivate a favourable atmosphere, but the timing of their two feature events – fixed as races three and four – did not give them a fair chance of delivering the most climactic build-up possible.

Race quality

The Coolmore America ‘Justify’ Matron Stakes and Irish Champion should not have been wrapped up within a little more than an hour and a half of the first ball being kicked.

The race quality instead ought to get better and better as the day goes on until the big one, in turn upping the ante on track throughout the afternoon.

To be fair, last weekend was not an ideal one for trying to accommodate all the various major sporting events from a terrestrial broadcasting point of view.

From the Irish Open to the Rugby World Cup, it’s understandable that some leeway may have been needed in an earlier slot than ideal being taken for the feature races.

That said, even if the Matron and Irish Champion were in later slots on another weekend – e.g. races six and seven – the premier race of the festival is over before the halfway mark of the weekend.

The main event is done with another circuit to race and that is not ideal by any means.

One solution would be for Leopardstown and the Curragh to swap places, and to have the Irish Champion Stakes as one of the final races of the entire weekend on Sunday. Now that would be a fitting build-up. The whole weekend boiling down to the biggest prize of all.

A host of factors go into what creates an atmosphere at the racecourse, and the anticipation that comes with the countdown to a feature race is one of them.

Countdown crescendo

By the time we arrive at an electric parade ring ahead of the Cheltenham Gold Cup in March, we have already been through 24 of the 28 races at the meeting and the excitement is tangible wherever you are.

The Grand National at Aintree is the 20th of 21 races across the three-day Liverpool bonanza. The Irish Grand National is the 21st of 23 races at Fairyhouse’s three-day Easter Festival.

And even on a major one-day meeting like British Champions Day at Ascot, the feature Champion Stakes is the penultimate event on the card.

Building to a crescendo heightens the atmosphere.

To go a step further and look specifically at a top-tier flat racing in a two-day format –like the Irish Champions Festival – there is probably no better template around the world than the Breeders’ Cup World Championships in the US.

The opening meeting, dubbed Future Stars Friday, sees five two-year-old events between turf and dirt before the tension ramps up with each race on the Saturday, culminating in the $4 million Breeders’ Cup Turf and $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic.

A slight tweak this year sees two sprint races after the main event, but the build-up still very much centres around the countdown to the Classic. It delivers the perfect set-up every year.

American template

A switch in dates between Leopardstown and the Curragh could see us build up to the Irish Champion like those Stateside gear up for the Classic.

Instead, last weekends’s running order of the Leopardstown card saw the second half of the card taper off in terms of quality when it should just be getting going.

This year’s race five, the Dullingham Park Stakes, is generally a competitive Group 2 but only twice in the 10 runnings of the Irish Champions Festival has the race been won by a horse who at any stage in their career managed to win a Group/Grade 1 (Suedois and Awtaad).

The last seven winners of the Paddy Power Stakes (race six last weekend) haven’t won in top-level company either, and the card was rounded off with a couple of big-field handicaps to really test punters for a finish.

In theory, having four Group 1 races on day two at the Curragh makes sense as a solid finale for the meeting, but the four-runner turnouts for the Goffs Vincent O’Brien National Stakes and Comer Group International Irish St Leger made for disappointing spectacles last weekend.

That is not necessarily the fault of those organising the meeting, but it’s difficult to say the Irish St Leger is a race that has really been capturing the public’s imagination lately anyway.

Quiet finish

To look a step beyond that, the Tattersalls Ireland Super Auction Sale Stakes, which follows the Leger, has attracted middling fields in recent years. Despite offering excellent prize money down to 10th, only 12 runners were declared and only two had previously won a race. Just 11 lined up in 2022 too, four of which had won beforehand.

A race should really be drawing greater quality to be able to feature on the Irish Champions Festival rota, though finding a solution to attract better runners in this contest isn’t clear-cut.

All told, the current layout of races sees a high-quality meeting go out a little quietly, and a switch around between Leopardstown and the Curragh - with the Irish Champion Stakes scheduled as one of the final races of the weekend - would surely ensure greater engagement right to the end.

At a time when attempts are being made to attract more racegoers back to the track post-Covid, maximising the raceday experience for those willing to get dressed up, get in their cars and pay in through the gate has to be a priority.

Horse Racing Ireland’s slogan for the Irish Champions Festival this year was ‘It All Comes Down to This’. For most racing fans, the weekend all comes down to the Irish Champion Stakes.

It should have a home on the programme that reflects that.