Massif battles to land Dundalk opener

Vinson Massif prevailed in a final furlong duel to land the opening two-year-old maiden at Dundalk this evening.

9/4 favourite Lottie Dod took them along in the five furlong contest but had to give way inside the final furlong.

Vinson Massif and Scrapper Blackwell came through together to grab the front-runner and it was the former who edged the verdict by a head under Joseph O'Brien.

The Ballydoyle winner was easy to back (3/1 out to 5/1 returned 4/1) and was showing nice improvement from his debut run at the Curragh last month.

"He tried. It's very hard to find races for two-year-olds the way the ground is," said the winning rider afterwards.

"He would be better over six or seven but you have to run where you can find the races on nice ground. The ground was very bad for his first run.

"He's a horse that works well at home. He could go for a nursery now and go from there."