MANY congratulations to Bangor’s Clare Cannon whose two-horse yard was on the mark last Thursday and Friday. At the traditional St Patrick’s Day meeting at Down Royal, the home-bred, hand-reared Mount Beckham scored for the first time, on his seventh start, when landing the opening two-mile Daily Mirror Maiden Hurdle in the hands of Sean Flanagan.a Running in the colours of Clare’s father Geoff, chairman of the Equine Council for Northern Ireland, the seven-year-old Desert King gelding is the first of just three recorded foals out of the unraced Nowhere Like Home.

That Exit To Nowhere mare is a half-sister to at least three winners including Mrs Wallensky (by Roselier) and Shannon Rose (by Topanoora). The latter is dam of the good track winners Minella Foru and Minella Hero and also of Sumkindofking who won the five-year-old geldings’ maiden at Inch on Wednesday.