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Gary Carson

Gary Carson

Fitzgerald shines on Diamond in opener

Fri 19th Apr 2024, 17:06

Rocky's Diamond and Shane Fitzgerald Rocky's Diamond and Shane Fitzgerald
© Photo Healy Racing

Shane Fitzgerald gave Rocky's Diamond a well judged ride from the front to spring a 22/1 shock in the opening four-year-old maiden hurdle at Limerick.

Declan Queally 's charge took them along in the two-miler and had a healthy lead going out on the final circuit.

The market leaders, Palamon (11/8f) and Mordor (6/4), tried to make up ground turning for home but Fitzgerald had kept a bit up his sleeve.

Rocky's Diamond, who traded as big as 100/1, galloped on strongly in the closing stages to record a five length win over the favourite.

The winner was taking a significant step forward from his debut effort at Gowran last month, having beaten only two home then.

"I had been disappointed with a couple of my runners in the past few weeks but was happy with the way this fella worked during the week and told David (Kiely, owner) to have a few quid on him,” said Queally.

"Shane gave him a great ride and he is a nice horse who jumps well. He is a half-brother to (six-time winner) The Little Yank, is a grand horse and we might send end up sending him to Doncaster (sales).

"His owner also had last year's champion point-to-pointer Rocky's Howya but he got a leg at the end of last year."

(Quotes by Tom Weekes)

1st
22/1
Tote €49.40 €9.80
2nd
5L
11/8Fav
€1.10
3rd
5L
6/4
€1.50
4th
12L
13/2
About Gary Carson
Gary started out as a trainee/assistant journalist with the Sporting Life newspaper and has worked in the racing industry for over 25 years. He has been with the Press Association since 2013 and won the Irish Field Nap Table in 2016. He enjoys working with horses and trained his own horse, Mamaslittlestar, to win a point-to-point in 2019.