Seventh Heaven for O'Brien and Heffernan

Seventh Heaven bounced right back to form in the Curragh today to give Aidan O'Brien his fifth Irish Oaks victory.

The 14/1 shot raced towards the rear of the 11-runner field before starting to make her move coming into the straight. She made sustained progress to move into contention on the run to the final furlong and was ridden to blast by Architecture with 200 yards to race.

She subsequently strode away to put two and three quarter lengths on Architecture (6/1) with Harlequeen (14/1) a further length and three parts back in third.

Winning jockey Seamie Heffernan said: "She's a nice, staying filly. She's an Oaks trial winner and didn't handle Epsom so it was simple. They are fillies, some of them turn up on the day and some of them don't.

"I've been happy with them all at home. Given the choice I would have picked Even Song so it was lucky I wasn't given the choice!

"They went a nice gallop and she was on the bridle all the way down to the two (pole) and she won well."

Aidan O'Brien said: "Seamus was riding her work. He had second pick and wanted to ride her. I was a bit surprised but Seamus had faith in her and he had been riding her.”

He joked: “We thought she didn't handle Lingfield and when she didn't handle that we thought she might handle Epsom. When we went back to Epsom she didn't handle that either!

“We thought she'd win very easy at Lingfield but she just won. The filly that was second was second in the Oaks though and second again today.

“Obviously the flat track suited better. She loved the ground and the flat track. She was always a high quality filly and Seamus gave her a lovely ride.

“They went a good gallop and on the different track we saw improvement. She's probably progressing.

“I was surprised when I saw her in the parade ring and had to take a second look at her to see the physical development.

“I suppose she could go to York, she'll love the flat track. She's a lovely big flowing Galileo filly.”

The 4/5 favourite Even Song never got competitive in finishing seventh. O'Brien said of her: "Ryan (Moore) said she was very slowly away out of the gates and then she just never fired up after that.

"I probably trained her hard for Ascot and I didn't want to train her real hard again so maybe Ascot just left a little bit of a mark on her. She's a big mare but we think she will come back."

There was a slight delay to the race as Ajman Princess shed a plate at the start.

This was O'Brien's 35th Irish Classic.

Paddy Power slashed Seventh Heaven from 33/1 to 5/1 for the Yorkshire Oaks.

Seventh Heaven brought up O'Brien's double as Peace Envoy also scored in the Anglesey Stakes.

Additional reporting by Gary Carson