It was a fairly bitter/sweet weekend, though probably more ‘sweet’ if I am honest.
Things went particularly well in the Red Mills Unraced at Clonmel which we won with Ballydoyle Honey (Brett Lee-Kildallon Maid, Jul 13) with our other dog Riverside Gold finishing second.
Honey is a cracking little bitch who won her last three and I personally think was a deserving winner of the final. 28.50 on winter going, including a salted track, is a decent runner at Clonmel.
She was originally qualified in 29.08 and offered for sale to a syndicate headed by Alison Coxon. I was a bit apprehensive and thought she seemed a bit expensive but she certainly looks good value for money now.
She is a half sister to Fear Emoski and could be as good when she goes over the distance. She was very strong at Clonmel and was pulling further away going into the pick-up.
Ireland is very good in having plenty of races restricted to bitches and we will probably keep her in that company, starting off with the Puppy Oaks at Shelbourne.
Riverside Gold (Godsend-Barber Fifty Five, May 13) is also a nice young dog. He led in every race, despite not trapping but just couldn’t get home.
He came out behind the bitch, was in front by the bend and went about three clear, but we knew he would be caught. He might make a dog for the English Derby, but next year, not this. You can’t send a boy to do a man’s job.
The sour note over the weekend was Clares Wonder going lame with a TFL muscle in the Gold Cup at Shelbourne.
Thankfully our other dog Elevenarife qualified. He was just picked up by Fiery Splendour in his semi final.
There is very little between the six finalists; the whole field is covered by just 21 spots.
Our lad has red in the final which will suit him and hopefully he will break a bit quicker.
He will almost certainly cause a bit of crowding because he does like to move middle going to the bend. It really is a very open final and any of the six could win it.
The weekend finished with me being presented with the Public Trainer of the Year award at Clonmel.
Unfortunately, I arrived late at the presentation had to be made at the kennels which was a bit embarrassing. I really didn’t mean to be disrespectful.
Looking further ahead, the big unraced stake at Tralee is next and I have a couple of runners in that.
There is a Westmead Hawk dog called Sidarian Vega and a brother of the bitch that won at Clonmel called Hovex Prince.
Both have very little on their cards in terms of official trials though I would hope they would both give a decent account of themselves.
Looking further ahead is the English Derby; hopefully Clares Wonder will be back in time. He is quite a strong dog and should be well suited to Wimbledon.
The biggest problem at Wimbledon is the position of the pick-up. It means the dogs are running 700 yards and the early paced dogs are really struggling in the latter stages of the competition, particularly when you have three runs within a week.
I thought Crokers Champ looked a good example of that last year.
Our coursing runner reached the second day at Clonmel and was beaten in the third round by the dog who eventually won the Derby, or more precisely was awarded the final.
We only really keep coursing dogs for my younger son, Timmy who loves both coursing and racing.
We have been here for 12 years now and Timmy is ‘the most Irish’. He plays Gaelic football and hurling for Golden.
The England/Ireland rugby should be particularly interesting. While the rest of the family will be cheering on England, Timmy will be cheering for Ireland.
If it goes badly I might be tempted to beat him up. But he’s getting a bit big for that now and I just might have bitten off more than I can chew.
