IT is usually difficult for the juvenile hurdlers of one season - correctly insulated from their elders through a comprehensive programme for high-class juveniles - when they step into open company and take on their elders the following season.

It is not a coincidence that only one five-year-old has won the Champion Hurdle since See You Then won the first of his three in 1985, and that no five-year-old has won the Irish Champion Hurdle since the Jim Bolger-trained Chirkpar won it in 1992.