Late races

A week made memorable by Fastorslow’s second consecutive win in the Ladbrokes Punchestown Gold Cup got even sweeter for Martin Brassil and the Mulryan family when Don’tstopthemusic produced an impressive performance to win the Howden Insurance Brokers Bumper.

Ridden by the in-form Derek O’Connor, who earlier on the card was seen at his best in partnering It’s On The Line to victory in the Event Power Champion Hunters’ Chase, the half-brother to Champion Chase winner Dodging Bullets showed a quality turn of foot to score by six lengths as a well-backed 5/2 chance (from 7/1).

Connections have had to show patience with this seven-year-old, who was making only his third start and returning from 274 days off.

“We always thought he was a nice horse, it just took him quite a bit of time to mature,” said Brassil.

“I had been gearing him towards more of a summer campaign but he’s done pieces of work with Fastorslow in the last month, maybe once or twice, and we were very pleased with what we could see. We won this two-and-a-quarter mile bumper with Longhouse Poet before so I said we’d let him take his chance in it and we got him here in nice shape. We’ll give him a little break now and have him back for Galway.

“He takes a bit of time between races but maybe as he gets older it might come easier to him.”

Eagle flies high

It was all change late on in the two-mile Uniquely Novice Hurdle. The Willie Mullins-trained Anotherway, sent off the 11/8 favourite, looked to have the race in safe keeping when clear on the run to the last and trading as low as 1/16 in the in-running markets.

However, he slowed down dramatically late on and could not repel the strong finishing effort of 22/1 shot Eagle Fang, trained by Bill Durkan and ridden by Oakley Brown.

Making his first start since finishing down the field in the Boodles Juvenile Handicap Hurdle, he bounced back to beat Ataboycharlie by half a length, with Anotherway only third.

Assistant trainer Gary Bannon said: “We were very disappointed at Cheltenham. We don’t know what was wrong with him, we checked him out when we got home and just put it down to maybe being in a big field for the first time.

“We came back with this plan and I was coming here with big hopes, thinking he’d run a big race. I thought he was overpriced.

“We’ll put him away now for the season and hopefully next year he’ll step up in trip; over three miles we’ll see a better horse.”