Things you may have missed this weekend including My Trump Card, I Am Superman & Becher Chase fallout

Superman Returns

I've never been but can imagine it takes quite a lot to raise the temperature at Dundalk on a Friday night, yet there was surely a certain amount of warmth derived from seeing I Am Superman back to winning ways on his belated Polytrack debut there last week.

Now seven years old, this horse’s most recent success in Ireland had come at Naas in July 2019, after which he went Down Under having changed hands and won a couple of Group 2 races at Rosehill, a racecourse whose mere existence appeared to be placed in considerable danger last week after the announcement of a A$5 billion housing/transport redevelopment on the site. I digress.

I Am Superman has returned to original trainer Michael O’Callaghan and, via a trip to Dubai on his way home, had found himself well handicapped if able to reproduce anything like his old form. He probably didn’t need to be back to his peak in the end, readily defying a mark of 95 to win by over three lengths as the 7/2 favourite under Colin Keane.

There will be plenty more opportunities on this surface over the winter and this looks another Superman story likely to run and run.

Where are Willie’s pre-Christmas crackers?

There was definitely an air of relief to Willie Mullins’ post-race RTV interview following El Fabiolo’s Hilly Way win on Sunday and no doubt the pressure had been building after he had failed to hit the target with his first half-dozen runners on the day at Cork.

There was only really Western Diego – 4/6 favourite for the maiden hurdle – who might have been fully entitled/expected to win, in fairness, but that one's limp performance was disappointing enough in isolation and it might have left the trainer considering a potentially broader issue regarding his string of novice hurdlers.

Keen early before finding next to nothing when asked, Western Diego’s effort wasn’t too dissimilar to that of odds-on flop Tullyhill at Punchestown last month, while Ballyburn was Mullins’ other novice with high-class bumper form turned over at skinny odds when runner-up on his jumping debut at Fairyhouse recently.

Things generally only really start to get serious for Mullins in this division over Christmas, and whatever he runs in the maidens at Leopardstown during that period will no doubt be telling, but on the evidence of this autumn and early-winter I’d forgive anyone for thinking twice about snapping up the 8/1 about Mirazur West for the Sky Bet Supreme before he’s jumped a hurdle in public.

Aces high for Elliott

At the time of writing Gordon Elliott leads W P Mullins by more than half a million euros in the Irish Jumps Trainers’ title race, but it’s worth stressing he has had more than double the amount of runners which is clearly some going.

Not many of Elliott’s slip through the net and My Trump Card won’t have been missed by most, but he’s an absolutely fascinating individual and worth exploring, especially as he was ridden by the man who bred him, a certain Patrick Mullins, when opening his account in Navan's two-mile bumper on Saturday.

Bective Stud shelled out 230,000 euros for My Trump Card at the 2021 Goffs Land Rover sale, after which he debuted in a maiden hurdle last November, finishing fourth behind Grangeclare West.

Elliott has obviously been keen to get more experience into him with a couple of runs in bumpers this winter but it was noteworthy to hear that he’ll now go back over hurdles for the rest of the season, an outing in something decent later this month no doubt the plan. He’s every inch a stayer by all accounts and has the makings of one who could go right to the top, particularly when the mud if flying.

Earlier on the same Navan card, the Bective silks were also carried to victory by Jigaro but I was more taken by Caldwell Potter who won the second maiden without breaking into a sweat. He’d bumped into the Mullins-trained It’s For Me at Punchestown last month but has strengthened up a lot according to his trainer and went one better with a commanding performance.

His similarly massive price tag (200,000 euros) was no doubt in part due to a superb pedigree, being a brother to the same stable’s ill-fated Grade 1 winner Mighty Potter, and a half-brother to French Dynamite, Indiana Jones and the highly promising recent Down Royal winner Brighterdaysahead, but he’s bang on course to make a real name for himself on the back of this display.

He might be ready for something like the Slaney Novice Hurdle (formerly Lawlor’s of Naas) next month as he’s probably not an out-and-out two-miler in the long run.

Consolation National no more than fantasy

Aintree was quite hard to watch at times on Saturday and one or two individuals may be needing to lay low for a while in order to make a full recovery, but less said about the drunken bar brawls the better.

There were a few who ended up all jelly-legged out on the track too but full credit to the five that completed the course in the Becher Chase, led home by Chambard under 5lb claimer Lucy Turner. She gave the winner a textbook prominent ride in the race and could be called the winner a fair way out, but I thought Danny Gilligan, Harry Reed, Brian Hughes and Charlie Deutsch all treated their respective mounts with maximum respect in defeat too.

Undersupervision (PU) and Lounge Lizard (fifth and last to finish) each lost a shoe and three horses unseated, but there wasn’t a faller remarkably and, given the underfoot conditions (this was the slowest Becher since 2006), things certainly didn't get too ugly in the finish which came as a bit of a relief.

It seems unfortunate the result is unlikely to have any sort of baring on the Grand National itself later in the season as even the winner might struggle to make the reduced final cut in April, but that’s the way it’s been for a while now with the Becher and I can’t even begin to get my head around the idea of a ‘consolation National’ that keeps getting floated.

Having two 34-runner divisions around the famous course at the same meeting, in place of the one 40-runner National, seems to go completely against everything the powers that be have been trying to achieve on the back of the latest changes announced in October, and I'm far from convinced consolation races are the way forward at the best of times.

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