Alain Cawley was in the winners enclosure at The Listowel Festival after winning The Brandon Hotel Maiden Hurdle aboard the Paul Nolan trained Alpha Ridge owned by Jim Mernagh.

Nolan said afterwards, "He won his bumper on testing ground last Christmas but didn't jump great on the better ground earlier in the year. We were going to run him over a longer trip later this week but decided it was best to start him over 2 miles on his first run back so it wouldn't be too hard on him. I hope he'll improve from that and he should make a nice chaser. He jumps fences better than he does hurdles and he's for sale."