JUST as the latest crop of equine talent was taking their first steps into competitive action, with the first four-year-old maiden races of 2025, those horses that had already come through the point-to-point academy certainly advertised its merits in a perfect symmetry to last weekend’s action.

Of the 14 races at the Dublin Racing Festival which featured a former point-to-pointer, six were won by a pointing export, with a further five races featuring at least one ex-pointer in the placings, including the Irish Gold Cup, where both Grangeclare West and Fact To File made the frame.