MANY congratulations to Scarva trainer Natalia Lupini who recorded the first double of her career on Monday at Naas where both winners were partnered by Wayne Lordan.

Running in the colours of the Raintree Racing Partnership, the nine-year-old Zebedee gelding Blairmayne made all to land the six-furlong handicap by a length and a quarter at odds of 20/1.

This was a seventh success for the bay and his third at the Co Kildare track. Blairmayne holds an entry in the seven-furlong premier handicap at Cork next Friday evening.

The double came up in the final race of the card, division two of the mile handicap, where Milena Mocchetti’s Magic Charm, who was up front throughout, justified 11/4 favouritism by two and a quarter lengths. This was a first win on his 15th start for the six-year-old Holy Roman Emperor gelding who had finished fourth over a similar trip at Leopardstown earlier in the month.

Other flat racing news concerns jockeys in Britain where, last Thursday week, Barry McHugh posted his first win of the new turf season in the five-furlong handicap at Beverley on the Adrian Nicholls-trained Tees Spirit.

Since his return from the United Arab Emirates, Patsy Cosgrave recorded his eighth successes on Wednesday at Wolverhampton where Martin Harley also partnered a winner. Darragh Keenan struck twice at Brighton on Tuesday.

Over jumps, and ahead of the Punchestown Festival, the Michael Millar-trained Deo Bellator, a nine-year-old Getaway mare, recorded her second career success in the three-mile handicap hurdle at Kilbeggan last Friday under owner, Neil Gault.

WITH point-to-pointing having returned to the local scene this weekend at Largy, jump racing fans will be well-catered for next week as Down Royal stages a meeting on Bank Holiday Monday and Downpatrick follows suit on Friday evening.

The feature race at the Club Mixers May Day fixture on Monday is the Club Orange Hurdle over three miles which last year was won by the Sneezy Foster-trained, Jordan Gainford-ridden Tullybeg.

At time of writing, Bective Stud’s Sholokhov gelding, who has since returned to the care of Gordon Elliott, was among the entries for the near two-and-a-half-mile Cidona Beginners Chase.

The mares’ handicap hurdle is the highest-valued race on the Downpatrick card and, 12 months ago, this extended two-mile, one-furlong contest was won by the Jim Dreaper-trained Shopping Around who was partnered to a three-parts of a length success by Keith Donoghue.