Champagne Mahler made all to win at Gowran Park in January© Photo Healy Racing
All eyes will be on the classy Ferny Hollow at Naas on Sunday as the former Champion Bumper winner returns to the racecourse for the first time in over two years in the Grade 3 Newlands Chase.
While there are good reports emanating from the Willie Mullins stable about the wellbeing of the nine-year-old ahead of his comeback run he doesn’t represent a betting proposition at short odds.
The handicaps at Naas look to offer some good each-way bets, particularly with bookmakers bet365 who offer extra places and enhanced odds each day on both Irish and UK horse racing.
The official going description ahead of the Naas meeting is Soft to Heavy and testing conditions like this favour horses with a proven ability to handle it.
Champagne Mahler relished the testing ground when making all the running over two miles at Gowran Park last month and has strong claims of a repeat performance in the 17 runner handicap hurdle at 3.25pm.
Champagne Mahler has gone up 11lbs in the handicap for the Gowran victory, but that may not be enough to stop him here as the Gowran form has already been franked by the runner-up, Kilbarry Saint, who won at Clonmel last week.
Rachael Blackmore replaces Daragh O’Keeffe aboard the Henry de Bromhead trained Champagne Mahler and off a nice racing weight of 10st 13lbs they will be hard to keep out of the frame.
The de Bromhead team, which is in a rich vein of form at present, is responsible for the joint topweights, Percy Warner and Shantreusse, in the Nas Na Riogh Handicap Chase at 2.25pm.
Rachael Blackmore partners Shantreusse while Percy Warner will be ridden by his regular partner Mikey O’Connor and it is the latter that could represent good each-way value in this 10 runner event.
Percy Warner is a somewhat quirky individual in that he needs to be ridden well off the pace and come through late and the presence of confirmed front-runner Kings Halo in the lineup should aid his cause.
This is a significant drop in class for Percy Warner who was far from disgraced when finishing sixth in a valuable handicap chase at the Dublin Racing Festival earlier in the month.
The third horse running at Naas that could represent each-way value is the Gordon Elliott trained Will Do in the sixteen runner Pertemps Handicap Hurdle Qualifier at 3.55pm.
The Elliott stable appears to have two better fancied runners in the shape of last time out winners Maxxum and Cleatus Poolaw which should ensure that Will Do goes off at a decent price.
Will Do was a decent Bumper performer last season when placed behind the likes of Fact To File and Tullyhill before opening his account at Cork in April. He then switched to hurdles and won his next two starts before his form flattened out a bit when sent handicapping in recent months.
It does, however, appear that the chief problem with his two previous handicap hurdle runs is that Will Do simply didn’t see out the distance on each occasion. He drops back two furlongs for Sunday’s race and this looks a positive step which should at the very least ensure he is in the mix.
Will Do finished behind Maxxum on both previous Handicap Hurdle runs, but enjoys a significant turnaround in the weights here and it is conceivable that he will reverse the form over this shorter distance.
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