IRISH PERFORMANCES OF THE WEEK

Shelbourne Park’s Night Of Stars card invariably produces an overall calibre of racing that arguably surpasses Derby Final night.

We usually go with two nominations for Shelbourne, given their four meetings per week.

The first choice was not too difficult – who could dispute the quality of Lenson Blinder’s 575 yard victory? It was the FOY and just seven spots outside the track record on a track that was hardly flying – taking formlines through other performances on the night.

We found it impossible to split Boynepark King and Blinder’s litter brother Slippy Cian for the second nomination. Running over the most used course in Irish racing, King recorded the joint 9^th fastest time of the year, 18 spots slower than Skywalker Logan’s best, but quicker than the highly rated Cabra Hurricane on the night.

Cian was five spots off his personal best and 17 slower than kennel mate Clonbrien Prince’s fastest of the year for the 550 yard Derby distance.

If breeding counts for anything, the winner of the Red Mills Future Champion Unraced Killer Bee (whose littermate Manzuka Manwas nominated last week) has entirely lived up to his pedigree. Meanwhile at Clonmel, Colarhouse Boss was only 10 spots off the fastest time of the year with a 28.48 run.

The Dundalk nomination is unusual, not in terms of the winning time, which has half a second slower than the fastest of the night, but the age of the winner. As a September ’17 whelp, Glenvale Dutch wouldn’t even be old enough to qualify on a GBGB circuit.