Inchidaly Robin tops Irish success in British points

 Image © Healy Racing

The British point-to-point season came to a close on June 1st, and it brought to an end a campaign which saw Irish exports once again make a significant impression.

The victory of Boys Will Be Boys, a horse that had won a four-year-old auction maiden at Ballingarry for Gary Murphy, in the Intermediate race at the season-ending Bratton Down was victory number 312 of the British season for a horse that had started their career pointing on this side of the Irish sea.

A number of them were for horses that were making a swift switch between the two countries. This included the Colin Bowe-trained Diamond Flush, who pulled-up at Tyrella in January in the last of his five starts in the Irish point-to-point sphere only to go on and win back-to-back races at Overton for Jack Teal in March and April.

Similarly, As The Lad Says had finished second in an older geldings’ maiden at Curraghmore on April 20th for JP Flavin, and within four weeks, he had won his maiden at Hexham for Thomas Fife.

There was also Irish success on the Welsh International card at Ffynnon Druidion with Carlow handler securing a double courtesy of Sharing Is Caring in the maiden at Jury Belle in the flat race.
 
However, the most notable success from the cohort of Irish exports on the British pointing scene undoubtedly came with Inchidaly Robin who was crowned as the season’s leading horse despite spending much of the season in Ireland.

The winner of an unplaced maiden at Tattersalls when with Alex Ott, the eight-year-old had run four times this season for Louis Archdeacon, culminating in a pulled-up effort in a winner-of-one at Bandon in early March.

Just 27 days later, he appeared in a two-runner restricted contest at Larkhill, a race that he won by just under two lengths.

That kickstarted a run of success for his South Wales handler Luke Price, which would see him take advantage of his favoured quick ground and small fields to win eight races in a row, including a title-winning success at Chaddesley Corbett on his first try in open company in Britain. 

“We never even thought of winning the leading horse title with him in the beginning,” Price said after securing the title.

“He likes quick ground, so we just ran him every week, just like we do with all the others, and he just kept winning.

“When it got to four or five winners we thought ‘oh we really could do it’. We didn’t make it the be-all and end-all. If he did it, happy days, if not, he had already done his job, as he was a cheap horse.

“We didn’t do anything with him from race to race. We have a two-furlong round gallop with deep sand; he would have three days off after he would run, then he would do five round, five round, five round and then run on the Saturday. If he wasn’t right, we wouldn’t run. He is a bit of a quirky horse, but you can tell when he is right.”