THE period between New Year’s Day and this coming weekend’s Dublin Racing Festival is a quiet one in Irish racing but there were still a few noteworthy performances in the last week.

Presenting Percy and Monbeg Notorious were the stars at Gowran Park on Thursday week last, winning the Galmoy Hurdle and the Goffs Thyestes Chase respectively, though in contrasting style. The former race was steadily-run with a fast finish (110% finishing speed) and resulted in a timefigure of just 93, while the latter ended up a thorough test (99% finishing speed) and prompted a timefigure of 149.