Irish point-to-point graduates have made a good start to the new national hunt season, with success in one of the traditional highlights of the early autumn campaign, the valuable Munster National.
Run in honour of the late point-to-point great, John Thomas McNamara, the 3-mile contest which carries a purse of €100,000, attracted a typically strong field with a maximum field of 16-runners racing the starter.
All the money prior to the off was for the Willie Mullins-trained Total Recall, and it certainly paid to follow that market move, as the Westerner gelding, who had opened in the morning at 9/4, routed the field in the hands of Ruby Walsh to defeat fellow Irish point-to-point graduate Alpha Des Obeaux by seven-lengths.
The success, which looked likely for a long way as the eight-year-old travelled all over his rivals into the home straight, marked a winning debut for the Willie Mullins yard, having previously been under the care of Sandra Hughes.
Total Recall had started off his career with Gerard Neilan, for whom he ran four-times between the flags – twice as a four-year-old without success, and twice as a five-year-old, with that final outing proving to be his first career success, when he claimed a five and six-year-old geldings’ maiden at Rathmorrissey under Derek O’Connor.
Relive the closing stages of his big race success in the Grade A contest below:
Bolted up! Total Recall wins the JT McNamara Ladbrokes Munster National at @LimerickRaces: pic.twitter.com/aHcUMzFxuM
— At The Races (@AtTheRaces) October 8, 2017
