Plenty of rain in Ireland provided a thorough test for the eight runners in the Gr1 Lawlor’s of Naas on Sunday afternoon.
The Gordon Elliott trained The Yellow Clay, a well-backed 11/4 second favourite, was a dominant eight-length winner.
Up and over! The Yellow Clay (Sam Ewing) on his march to Cheltenham (Pic – Naas Racecourse)
The six-year-old travelled well under Sam Ewing following his pace-making stable companion Wingman in third for most of the 4000m journey.
He moved up easily on the turn for home, jumped on at the second last and kept up the gallop to score easily.
That took The Yellow Clay’s record over hurdles to four from four and represented his best effort yet. The Yeats gelding added his name to a notable recent roll of honour including Envoi Allen and Bob Olinger.
They went on to win the Turners at the Cheltenham Festival and Elliott’s initial reaction was that The Yellow Clay would be aimed at that same Novice championship event this March.
He’s currently quoted second favourite behind Challow Novices’ Hurdle winner The New Lion, subsequently purchased by JP McManus, in the betting for the Turners.
A muddied Sam Ewing after his big win at Naas (Pic – Naas Racecourse)
Jasmin De Vaux, winner of last season’s Champion Bumper, was favourite after a convincing Navan maiden success last month, but disappointed finishing fourth.
He didn’t jump with any fluency down the back straight and was passed by his stable companion Supersundae, who finished well for second.
The pace setter Wingmen ran a commendable third and should be followed over further.
Earlier, the Willie Mullins-trained Ile Atlantique was given a fine ride by Paul Townend to win the Gr2 Racing Post Novice Chase over two miles.
The seven-year-old was backing up his chasing debut success at Navan in early December and was never far off the pace. The Tony Bloom-owned seven-year-old jumped well in the main and was kept wide coming into the home straight.
With fellow pace-maker Firefox making several jumping errors over the last five fences, the Mullins runner ultimately found another gear after the last and drew away to score by five lengths.
The disappointment of the race was 11/10 favourite Inthepocket, who didn’t jump well throughout, and found little for pressure under Rachael Blackmore in the straight.
Willie Mullins noted: “His efficient jumping won it for him. He loves that ground and from an early stage you could see he was jumping more efficiently than everything else. He’s one that we can now go two miles or two-and-a-half. We’ll look at the Dublin Racing Festival and see which direction we go.”
“Majborough would be in the two-mile race (Irish Arkle) and maybe he could go along with him. We have a few for the two-mile-five-furlong race, which would look the place where Ballyburn would go.”
