Crystal Black justifies strong market support to land Curragh gamble

Crystal Black brought up some nice bets when keeping on strongly inside the last furlong under Seamie Heffernan to run out a cosy winner of the Revamp Conservation & Restoration Handicap at the Curragh.

Trained by Gerard Keane, the five-year-old had dropped to a mark of 77 having been rated in the nineties earlier in his career.

Having just his fourth start for the Keane stable since joining from Dermot Weld, the Teofilo gelding was always close to the pace under Seamie Heffernan before switching to the stands rail over a furlong out.

Keeping on well inside the last, he headed leader Free Solo over 100 yards out, landing a tidy gamble in the process.

Put in at 22/1 overnight, the winner was returned at 5/1f.

Gerry Keane said:- “He's a horse that's had a lot of niggles. He ran a nice race here the last day and was finishing very well.

“We bought him and he had a lot of problems, he's still only recovering from the time Mr Weld's horses had some sort of a virus or something.

“He has loads of ability but we found it hard trying to get him right. We thought he was coming on his last couple of runs and he was fit today.

“Today was going to be his day unless something went really wrong.

“He's a lovely big horse. He won his maiden over a mile-and-one at Ballinrobe and he was high enough then.

“He's come down 6lb since we got him, I don't think it made a difference to him anyway.

“He has an entry in the Cambridgeshire and if he gets in he'll probably run.

“He's turned a corner and the horses at home are running well this season for some reason. We only have a handle but they are all running well. We're not doing anything different. You just can't do it without the horses.”

Additional reporting by Gary Carson