Patrick Mullins’ Monday trip to Cumbria paid off when He’s On Fire ran out a bloodless winner of the Come Racing At Carlisle In 2026 Maiden Hurdle.
Susannah Ricci’s charge was making his first start for trainer Willie Mullins and, sent off as the 2/9 favourite, travelled as strongly as the market suggested he should.
Only The Dog Thief threatened to give him a race but after making much of the running, he was playing second fiddle from the penultimate flight, He's On Fire storming clear to score by 20 lengths.
The winner holds entries in both the Sky Bet Supreme Novices' Hurdle and Turners at next month's Cheltenham Festival.
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“He’s a fine horse, a real chasing type and I can’t wait to see him next year,” the winning rider told Racing TV.
“He came over to us late in the season and you can see why he was probably backward in his first two run, then he ran really well in his third run in France and we bought him. He needed a bit of time to acclimatise and we wanted to get a nice confidence booster into him.
“I know he’s lost his novice status now but I think we want to go chasing with him next year so that was ideal today. We had him entered up everywhere over here and were wanting to find a race that on his rating he’d win and that’s what he’s done.”
As for future plans he added: “He can’t go to a Cheltenham handicap, it’s five runs there now, so we might look to Aintree and Punchestown perhaps but really we want to go chasing with him, get a few runs into him this year and I’m excited about him as a chaser next year.”
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